Urban Community Gardens as a Climate Change Adaptation Stratergy

Abstract

Public spaces in the City of Tshwane, are spaces for social cohesion and knowledge exchange. However, the treatment of open greenspaces has been lacklustre in recent years, perpetuating the idea that closing them off to the public will be easier to maintain by controlling their accessibility. Therefore, we need to look at new ways of establishing impactful and productive open green public spaces that promote social cohesion, tackle issues that arise from climate change and create a better urban environment for the residents of our city. This study aims to close the gap between public space use and function, particularly concerning climate change adaptation strategies. Additionally, it stives to give insight into how spaces that are geared towards urban agriculture, just as Moja Gabedi is, can achieve the objective of being climate change adaptation strategies and become positive climate, and social contributors to the communities around them. A mixed method case study of the Moja Gabedi Gardens in Hatfield, Pretoria has been selected for this research; with study tools ranging from desktop studies to observational mapping of the site, its activities, and its users. This method was ideal for understanding how spaces and their users interact and affect each other while confronting the biases that researchers may have when working in vulnerable communities. The findings of this study reveal that Moja Gabedi not only offers beneficial therapeutic services to its users, but it also contributes to the physical wellbeing of the urban context in its immediate vicinity. This became evident in the manner in which it does not entirely depend on municipal infrastructure to be successful; the tangible change it has developed in the users from Reliable House; and the health and economic benefits it has given to the users in Rissik Park. This report aims to contribute to the current discourse in the architectural and climate research sectors. It demonstrates that small urban food security initiatives are twofold, in that they tackle food concerns and improve the physical, mental, spiritual, and economic well-being of the city and its residents. It is through this transforming of negative spaces into green spaces, that we can add value to urban context while ameliorating the impacts of climate change, which are the highest in cities.