Field Notes: Seattle Community Garden

Editor’s Note: This edition of Field Notes highlights a community garden success story in Seattle. For a look at how Vancouver has created impact in the connection of food and public spaces around the city, be sure to check out the City of Vancouver Food Strategy: What Feeds Us video.

Seattle is often known as one of the world leaders in sustainability through initiatives such as local grass roots activism. This is also reflected in the many cyclists throughout the city, bike lanes, bike share programs (as well as pick-up and drop-off helmet program), various bioswales, and numerous community gardens. One of these community gardens is called the Belltown P-Patch Community Garden. A P-Patch, a term specific to Seattle, is a parcel of property used for gardening (otherwise known as pea-patch). The P-Patch program started decades ago and has gained much momentum by inspiring a local movement of urban agriculture.

Today, Seattle has over 80 community gardens with thousands of volunteers actively involved. The land that Belltown P-Patch sits on today was purchased by the City of Seattle in 1993 and transformed into a community garden. Today the community garden is surrounded by residential buildings, high-rises, and a close walk to the City centre. This community garden is quite artsy, with many local artist enhancing the space through mosaic walls, stone paths, decorative railings and garden decorations. The three remaining cottages in the community garden are also used for meeting and educational rooms. It is a joy to wander through this garden, and experience the artistic taste of local artists, and the various vegetation and flowers planted here by the Belltown neighbourhood.

Evidently, Seattle is learning from other communities and cities about adapting themselves to increasing population densities by creating more greenspaces, rooftop gardening, and natural drainage system. More and more people are creating impromptu community gardens, a focal point for community engagement, ecological thinking through public education, and sustainable agriculture.