Location: Barcelona, Spain
City population: 3,186,049
Project duration: 2011 - 2014
Project cost: Unknown
Financing source(s): Crowd-sourcing

Urban gardens of Poblenou

Horts indignats del Poblenou

It is a community garden initiated by the autonomous assembly of the Poblenou neighborhood. It has changed location a number of times, eventually occupying the empty lot of demolished buildings. Over time the garden expanded taking over an adjacent empty space, as well as other yards in the neighborhood. The garden is not maintained for strictly productivity purposes, especially because much of its soil has been contaminated by a soap factory. It is rather used as a space for social encounter and knowledge sharing on planting and working with the earth on communitarian basis (1 and description provided by CEU).
Weblink: http://bcncomuns.net/es/cpt/hort-indignat-poblenou/

Urban setting

  • Allotments and community gardens
    • Community gardens
    • Horticulture
  • Derelict areas
    • Abandoned and derelict spaces with growth of wilderness or green features

Key challenges

  • Water management (SDG 6)
  • Green space, habitats and biodiversity (SDG 15)
  • Environmental quality, including air quality and waste management
  • Regeneration, land-use and urban development
  • Inclusive and effective governance (SDG 16)
  • Social justice, cohesion and equity (SDG 10)
  • Health and well-being (SDG 3)
  • Economic development and decent employment (SDG 8)

Main beneficiaries

  • Citizens or community groups
Project objectives
The social assembly of the Poblenou constitutes a commission of urban gardens with the objective of recovering empty spaces of the neighborhood for the neighbors through the practice of the urban agriculture community (1).
Implementation activities
The development of the activity in the orchard at first develops between the discretion and the will to become a space for the neighbors of the neighborhood. The context of crisis and the discrediting of the banks and the construction sector legitimizes the practice of urban agriculture to the neighbors, and many neighbors who know the existence of the garden are interested in participating. The lack of space within the orchard generates the occupation of an adjacent plot and the creation of the indignant garden 2 by the middle of 2012. This second orchard is much more visible and has a better quality soil as well as more hours of sunlight. At the end of 2012 a local terer is occupied adjacent to the Ateneu Flor de Maig, with the objective of providing food to the Ateneu cooperative, But the initiative is dismissed for fear of damaging the consolidation of the Ateneu Flor de Maig. Occupants of a third orchard are expelled and occupy another property (1).

Type of initiating organisation

  • Citizens or Community groups

Management set-up

Led by non-government actors

Participatory approaches/ community involvement

  • Co-planning
  • Crowd-sourcing/Crowd-funding/Participatory bdget
  • Taskforce groups
  • Dissemination of information and education
  • Joint implementation (e.g. tree planting)
  • Co-management/Joint management
  • Citizen oversight (e.g. boards, advisory)
  • Citizen monitoring and review
Details on the roles of the organisations involved in the project
The experience of the Orchard Commission of the 15M movement in Plaza Catalunya influences some neighbors, who decide to launch the space recovery project. The orchard is defined as a "free, self-managed and communal space where decisions are made in assembly, an open access space and a meeting point for the vecions, a garden but also a space for creation". The management of the orchard is based on an assembly where all users of plots participate and is open to all neighbors who want to participate. The assembly also regulates the provision of water. Although a system for collecting water from public watering holes has been established, the water collected by this system is only for the community area. The irrigation of the plots has to be carried out with the collection of water from the nearest public source or through the water collected from the rain. as part of the 15M movement, the indignant garden refuses to participate in agreements with the local administration (1).
Project implemented in response to ...
... an EU policy or strategy? No
It is a voluntary initiative of a group of citizens that deliberately kept themselves detached from public institutions (1).
... a national policy or strategy? No
It is a voluntary initiative of a group of citizens that deliberately kept themselves detached from public institutions (1).
... a local policy or strategy? No
It is a voluntary initiative of a group of citizens that deliberately kept themselves detached from public institutions (1).
Expected impacts
  • Regeneration, land-use and urban development
  • Inclusive and effective governance (SDG 16)
  • Social justice, cohesion and equity (SDG 10)
  • Health and well-being (SDG 3)
  • Sustainable consumption and production (SDG 12)
Details on impacts and indicators used The Outraged Garden of Poblenou generates results in terms of the creation of a new community equipment for public use, the creation of common knowledge on urban agriculture and the creation of new spaces of sociability within the neighborhood through the dynamization. From this point of view the orchard can be considered an outdoor equipment managed collectively (1).

Presence of formal monitoring system

No

Presence of indicators used in reporting

No

Presence of monitoring/ evaluation reports

No

Availability of a web-based monitoring tool

No
1. NBS website: http://bcncomuns.net/es/cpt/hort-indignat-poblenou/
2. Cessation of activity: http://www.assembleasocial.poblenou.org/

 

Disclaimer: The data collection was carried out between June and August 2017, the information presented has not been updated afterwards.