Rebel Gardens. From the Right to the City, to the Green Revolution

Javier Orlando Mora Pedraza

jomorap228@gmail.com

Politecnico di Milano, Italia

Received: April 14, 2023 | Accepted: October 12, 2023

Contrary to traditional belief, social structures can be built from the bottom up, and one way of doing this is through collective initiatives of various kinds. The end of the 20th century saw the emergence of the so-called "Bottom-up Urbanism" emerged, an alternative approach to citizen-led planning intended to transform urban spaces. This article is intended to present the planning process, execution, and operation of a series of initiatives in some poor neighborhoods in the south west of Bogotá that created gardens and orchards in places that previously had no specific use or had been abandoned.

Keywords: Urban gardens, popular organization, participatory urbanism, collective intelligence, urban orchards, informality, self-management.

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It could be said that now is the time for green. The importance of looking for a sustainable future, of respecting and caring for the environment is a constant theme in the media, in academia and even in everyday conversations. In recent years, governments and municipal authorities have devoted significant efforts to revitalizing and greening cities by developing parks and recreational spaces. For example, an article published on the BBC News Mundo website says¹:

Thus, Barcelona, Paris and Sweden are currently committed to becoming cities of proximity, proposals that coincide in several aspects: restrict the space allocated to cars and favoring an urban life of proximity (Mayorga, 2021).

However, not only has there been a proliferation of large-scale projects, but also a growing interest in urban gardens and orchards, which can play an important role in the return of nature to our cities, as they create biodiversity reserves or biological corridors.

Gardens and orchards cannot be described simply as green spaces, as they also represent a search for something deeper, a species of return to the primordial. They are not simply spaces associated with consumption practices or the production of certain foods, but also places of encounter and social construction. Thus, the gardens created by communities in the poor neighborhoods of southwestern Bogotá have become stages of transformation of an urban fabric consisting of degraded or neglected places. They constitute a revolutionary act: they are urban interventions aimed at reevaluating the spaces where they are found, strengthening the community and effecting a small-scale transformation of the city.

In the Bogotá of today, one phenomenon is evident: the rupture of social relations caused by gated communities. This has accentuated the division between the private and the public, with the progressive deterioration not only of collective spaces, but also of the interactions between people. The architect Fernando de la Carrera explains this recent phenomenon in greater depth in an article titled Rejalópolis: Ciudad de fronteras (Railingopolis: city of frontiers):

The traditional urban fabric, which obeyed the infrastructure requirements of individual lots, has been replaced by super blocks that cause discontinuity with the road layout of pre-existing neighborhoods. This characteristic results in monotonous and less permeable environments that impede the alternative or redundant routes that could invigorate life and urban relationships (De la Carrera, 2015, 19 - 20).

Bogotá's neighborhoods, once based on spatial self-management and collaboration, have undergone a gradual process in which the participation of their inhabitants in decision-making about the places in which they live have fallen—a phenomenon the British geographer David Harvey called the "social alienation" in a 2015 interview conducted in Bogotá:

Neoliberalism has trained us to be cynical, so we don't think anything significant can happen, and we can't do anything meaningful with our lives. I think neoliberalism has been profoundly alienating; people live in alienation, and this is in a sense a state of hopelessness (Harvey 2015).²

However, in certain social housing developments, inhabitants have developed a different form of collective organization, one that is tactical, empirical and local, involving a degree of planning to take advantage of the chaos and to allow flexibility and adaptability. This is why in the same interview Harvey (2015) indicates that, "it takes a little chaos to be able to do something; total chaos is bad, but a certain amount of it can be fertile ground to do different and innovative things".

This fosters an atmosphere of encounter and exchange between different types of people, who in circumstances other than those offered by their place of residence, would not have met. It provokes spontaneous and accidental interactions, making urban life much more active and livelier than in districts of higher socioeconomic class. De la Carrera explains this phenomenon as follows:

Neighborhoods that have evolved in this way, although they may present unfinished and apparently disordered city landscapes, have a rich urban life, which produces heterogeneous communities. They are also more controlled by the residents themselves thanks to the frequent opportunities of access; at the same time less dependent on commuting because stores and services are found nearby (De la Carrera 2015, 21).

In turn, heterogeneous communities coexist in these neighborhoods, communities made up of families with different origins and traditions, which must share a space of common use under the strict rules of horizontal property³, which restrict many community participation initiatives. As a consequence of this "hyperregulation"⁴, many neighborhood interventions are carried out in adjacent public spaces rather than inside the complexes themselves, since these public spaces are considered to be of little value, being seen instead as the waste product of urbanization rather than places of encounter, leisure and social construction.

It is in this limbo that a series of practices that have often been stigmatized by public institutions take place — institutions that are responsible for the management, adaptation, and maintenance of public spaces, but that have stood by and left them to decay. These interventions are an example of the vitality and collective spirit of these neighborhoods, which find in gardens and orchards a way to consolidate their communities. Not only does this element have a functional character that provides an alternative in the search for resilient societies based on food sovereignty, but it also has a transcendental character—providing meaning at a time of enormous environmental and social challenges.

According to the 2020 Greenpeace Colombia report, Situación actual del espacio público verde en Bogotá, 80% of the population of Bogotá lives with a deficit of green areas. The report quotes the suggestion of the World Health Organization that each inhabitant of a city should have a minimum of 10m² of public green space each, but found that that in deficit localities such as Kennedy there are only 4.4 m² per person. For this reason, this exploratory study of urban gardens and orchards presents three case studies from this area of the city, representative of Bogotá as a whole, as evidenced by the 2017 encuesta multipropósito (multipurpose survey) conducted by the municipality and the Departamento Administrativo Nacional de Estadísticas (National Administrative Statistical Department), which shows that values such as the Índice de Condición de Vida (Condition of Life Index, ICV)⁵ correspond to the city average, and that the predominant form of land use is residential.

This paper is an initial approach intended to analyze the planning, execution and operation processes carried out by individuals, popular organizations and communities involved in self-managed urban garden and orchard projects in the neighborhood of Kennedy in south western Bogotá. For this purpose, a series of interviews and conversations was conducted with the actors involved in these processes, together with a couple of visits staggered over time to identify the changes experienced between their initiation and development and their consolidation phases. Finally, a review of the impact on communities is presented, which makes use of material collected previously in order to understand how people approach and manage these practices, generally without the involvement of public bodies.

It is worth mentioning that in Bogotá the practice of urban gardening is duly regulated by Acuerdo (Agreement) 605 of 2015, which contains guidelines for the accompaniment, promotion, dissemination and registration of orchards in the city. In his undergraduate thesis, La huerta urbana en Bogotá: Interpretaciones y modos de hacer (The urban orchard in Bogotá: Interpretations and ways of doing), the sociologist Farid Garzon sums up the public policy that regulates this practice in the city:

…[t]he first guideline states that the District Environmental Secretary in coordination with the José Celestino Mutis Botanical Garden⁶ and the secretaries of social action, economic development, government and health are responsible for proposing and implementing programs of action to facilitate activities and thus solve unsatisfied food sovereignty needs (Garzón 2020, 48).

It should be mentioned that this topic has been the subject of study in recent years, with a particular focus on urban agriculture. Examples include Agroecological urban agriculture from the perspective of health promotion published in 2015 by Silvana Ribeiro, Claudia Bogus and Helena Wada from the University of Sao Paulo; Urban agriculture in the making or gardening as epistemology, published in 2020 by Michael Granzow and Kevin Jones from the University of Alberta in Canada and Home gardening and urban agriculture for advancing food and nutritional security in response to the COVID-19 pandemic, published by Rattan Lal from the Ohio State University in late 2021. These studies focus on the concept of food security, understood as the stable availability of food, which also encourages healthy habits and respect for the environment. In turn, they analyze the spaces in terms of the physical, spatial and economic spheres they inhabit, without paying much attention to the social processes, cultural values and practices associated with the gardens. Therefore, this article approaches the practice in a different way, presenting these spaces not only as simple community gardens, or urban agriculture projects, but also sees gardening as a practice that promotes new ways of living, creating, thinking, and making the city.

In recent years, Bogotá, and in particular the peripheral areas of the city, have experienced the emergence of social movements intended to enhance the practice of urban agriculture. Garzon's thesis identifies various collectives such as: Mujer, tierra y memoria (Women, land and memory) and the Red agroecológica del sur (Agro-ecological network of the south), which have been developing projects in vulnerable areas of the southeast of the capital and have:

[…] made several journeys through different gardens in the Ciudad Bolivar district, at the end of 2020 […] with the aim not only of sharing knowledge and showing the fruits of work in the garden […] but also as a vehicle to generate processes and bring together activities and dialogue about urban agriculture and the protection of the Santa Viviana Park, which has been affected by the construction of illegal homes. (Garzón 2020, 56)

Thus, it is evident how these green spaces not only respond to a logic involving the consumption and production of food, but also constitute an alternative that protects and appropriates public space. Orchards and gardens could therefore be considered to be elements with enormous potential for creating cohesion and strengthening individuals, along with their environments and communities.

What motivates these people to go out and work in a garden? In terms that are similar to those voiced by the inhabitants of Ciudad Bolivar, in discussions with the residents of the south western neighborhoods of Kennedy they mentioned how many of them had grown up in rural areas but that, due to an absence of opportunities in their places of origin, they had moved to the cities, specifically to peripheral areas, which at the time (the 80s and 90s) lacked public services, suffered from deep social problems and lacked urban planning.

Perhaps they are motivated by that ancient need to touch the earth with our hands, to forge our links with it anew, as in the Greek myth about the giant Anteus, who drew his strength from the soil, but who became vulnerable when he was away from it. In his book Jardines en tiempos de guerra (Gardens in times of war), Teodor Cerić explains how nostalgia is also implicit in this search:

Gardens (all gardens—from the park of Versailles to the smallest suburban orchard) are born of the most desperate love that exists, the love for a life that we have not known but that is familiar to us, that loved us like a mother and that never ceases to call us. They are born of a desire that, there, among the plants, finds relief, no longer burns and becomes a promise (Cerić 2018, 106).

These kinds of intervention are characterized in particular by their temporality and flexibility, two aspects that differentiate them from conventional urban planning processes. It is for this reason that they are widely accepted by the population, since they adjust to the daily lives people lead and to the needs of the moment. However, as many of these urban practices start in abandoned spaces, wasteland or decaying infrastructure, they face countless obstacles throughout their implementation. For this reason, many of these "Bottom-up" initiatives are transitory and end long before they can be used to their full potential. Nevertheless, below, I present three initiatives that remain valid today, and which have grown stronger over time:

gardens in the time of pandemic

No voices now speak to man from stones, plants, and animals, nor does he speak to them believing they can hear. His contact with nature has gone, and with it has gone the profound emotional energy that this symbolic connection supplied.
Carl Jung, Man and his symbols

The first example of this "Bottom-up" urbanism is located in the park of the housing development known as Ciudadela Primavera, located in the south west of Bogotá. This area is characterized by the development of social housing at the start of the new millennium. During the information gathering process I was told that the inhabitants of the housing group Tabatinga 1 mainly came from Boyacá, an agricultural region of Colombia, and that many of them were originally from peasant families. At the beginning, some of these migrants tried to create community gardens within the gated communities, but because of the excessive regulation of common spaces, it was impossible to carry out the project successfully.

The turning point came with the mandatory lockdown decreed by the Bogotá municipal authorities in early 2021 in order to contain the COVID-19 virus. The green areas and shrubs along the footpaths were left untended by the authorities, resulting in their progressive deterioration. This led a group of residents to organize, initially to maintain hedges consisting of Eugenia Myrtifolia, a species that, because of its size and rapid growth, requires frequent pruning. However, these circumstances gave them the opportunity to recuperate the idea of community gardens, using the park's free spaces for the purpose.

Figure 1_ Hedges consisting of the species Eugenia Myrtifolia, located at the entrance to one of the residential complexes of Ciudadela Primavera (February 2022). Source: Photography by Javier Mora.

This process began as a personal initiative of Maria, one of the inhabitants of the complex, a housewife who, during lockdown, was able to delegate many of her ordinary roles to her husband and children who were at home all day. With a little more time at her disposal, she began to maintain the hedges in front of the entrance to her residence. One of her motivations was the sense of annoyance it caused her to see their state of abandonment, while her passion for gardening was a further spur to taking action in the matter. Her enthusiasm was shared by other housewives who lived in the complex, who joined her little by little until the initiative expanded to the adjacent park, a strip of green in poor condition.

This is how the first forms of appropriation of the park occurred, transforming an area that had been nothing into a small garden, changing the spatial imaginary of the place as a result. The raw materials used for these transformations, in addition to organization and collaboration between residents, were wood, tires, paint, and soil, mostly obtained through recycling or purchased directly by residents. Thanks to this, during the hardest period of the pandemic, the bonds between the members of the community were strengthened, as they had the excuse to plant ornamental plants such as platanillo (heliconia) and "holly liso", aromatic herbs such as lemongrass and calendula, and fruit trees such as mountain papaya, fig, plum and peach, which in popular tradition are used to produce desserts and jams.

Figure 2_ Garden planted in a corner of the park, enclosed by recycled tires and used for planting fruit trees such as peach and plum (February 2022). Source: Photography by Javier Mora.

Figure 3_ Green strip by sidewalk, used as a garden, fenced in using recycled wood. Used for planting trees and aromatic herbs (February 2022). Source: Photography by Javier Mora.

The end of the health emergency decreed by the Bogotá municipal authorities in mid-2022 did not mean the end of the gardens. On the contrary, it strengthened the citizen network, permitting the creation of meeting spaces to teach about the planting of orchards and gardens in urban environments, which were managed by the residents themselves. Furthermore, during one of the visits to the park by officials of the Bogotá Botanical Garden, as part of a reforestation project, participants had the opportunity to make contact with the institution. This not only allowed their interventions in public space to continue, but also led to a training workshop in gardening practices and urban agriculture.

Today, the spaces are managed by the small community that created it, maintaining its autonomy as a simple group of gardening enthusiasts. Most of the plants grown in these orchards or gardens are ornamental plants or aromatic herbs, plus a few fruit trees, with the result that beyond being a source of food, they actually provide an educational space that shows locals and visitors the benefits of gardens and orchards. They teach about the great variety of aromatic plants and home remedies and how to combat pests and create organic fertilizers with kitchen waste.

Figures 4 and 5_ Maria, from a peasant family in the region of Boyacá and, one of the members of the garden maintenance sector (March 2023). Source: Photographs by Orlando Antonio Mora.

re-naturing the sidewalk

Planting a garden is always a worthwhile activity. If we have little time, if around us the world wavers and death, in all its forms, advances, the only thing we can do is to transform a plot of land, it doesn't matter which one, into a welcoming place, a place that invites more life in.
Teodor Ceric, Gardens in times of war

Another example of this type of intervention can be found just half a kilometer from the Ciudadela Primavera Park in an enclave created by the space between an enclave of gated housing complexes and the neighborhood Unir 1, a housing project developed by Mariano Porras and the Cooperativa Multiactiva Orión Ltda. in 1992⁷. As a result of bad management, the project, which was initially planned to be completed in 18 months, only delivered the building plots, without streets or public services, with the result that its residents had to build their homes themselves. The neighborhood only received official recognition in 1996, after which the slow process of public infrastructure provision began.

Figure 6_ The current situation of 26^th Street south. On the left is the Unir 1 neighborhood, and on the right the housing complexes of the Ciudadela Primavera Urbanization (March 2023). Source: Photography by Orlando Antonio Mora.

One of its boundaries is made up of Calle 26 Sur (26th Street South), the only thoroughfare that connects this neighborhood with the rest of the city. The municipal administration acquired some land to expand the road. However, so far, this project has not been completed, leaving some vacant spaces without specific use and creating a strip of land that separates it from the surrounding housing complexes. This arid soil was no place to create a garden. It consisted of rubble and gravel, a hostile terrain where, a priori, only a few areas of grass and herbs could hang on tenaciously, creating a small area of vegetation. The area was occupied by trucks, in large parking areas.

Figure 7_ Small garden located in one of the stretches awaiting development. Invaded by cars, it is one of the remnants of the first interventions made by residents and serves as a barrier to expansion of the parking area (March 2023). Source: Photography by Orlando Antonio Mora.

The residents were aware of the long process ahead. In 2016, several community members organized to free the area from trucks. Once the space had been recuperated, they greened it with grass and planted species capable of surviving the conditions there. Within a few months, the gardens had been filled with a surprising variety of shrubs and herbs, such as calla lilies, heliconia, peppermint, mint, rue and coriander, all of which are capable of withstanding the pollution and contamination that plagues the area. Where before there was nothing but dry earth, little by little the area filled up with life. It should be mentioned that up to this point the process was carried out autonomously by the residents involved in the project, using their own resources.

Figure 8_ Today, one of the sections recovered by the residents constitutes one of the most important green areas in the zone, thanks to the variety of floral species and the refuge it offers to various species of bird (March 2023). Source: Photography by Orlando Antonio Mora.

It has been a couple of years since the first gardens began to sprout, and although some areas are still occupied by cars, the sector remains one of the few green areas in the Unir 1 neighborhood. The vigor and appropriation of these first interventions continue to characterize the residents. Thus, after the municipal authorities carried out a series of paving and repair works in the sidewalks, the community embellished the spaces with plants they grew inside reused tires. In addition, they built pathways using local materials, such as guadua (a large bamboo) to connect the informal neighborhood with the gated communities.

Likewise, despite the years that have elapsed since the initiative began, the work that has been carried out in these gardens continues in permanent evolution, and the leaders and members recognize that they are taking the first steps towards the consolidation of the different processes involved in the project, despite the many kinds of adversity they have faced. Thus, in 2019, an alliance was established with the Junta de Acción Comunal (community action board, JAC) to develop mechanisms for participation, dissemination and preservation of the spaces, with the involvement of as many community members as possible, and to obtain the resources required to maintain the gardens.

Figure 9_ A small path made with guadua and rammed earth serves as a connection between the Unir 1 neighborhood and Ciudadela Primavera (March 2023). Source: Photography by Orlando Antonio Mora.

Figure 10_ Bollards and concrete blocks reused by the community after the one of the sections of the street was re-paved (March 2023). Source: Photography by Orlando Antonio Mora.

revaluation of the 38th street south canal

"Gardening, by externalizing man's [sic] center of gravity of man, in the space, at once familiar and mysterious, of the living allows him to rediscover, at least during the time devoted to that activity, a lost well-being.
Marco Martella, A small world, a perfect world

The last example presented in this article corresponds to a series of interventions carried out by the inhabitants of the neighborhoods Patio Bonito and Riveras de Occidente in south west Bogotá, which are separated by the Calle 38 Sur canal (38th Street South canal) The first, Patio Bonito, had its origins in one of the largest informal urbanization processes in Bogotá's history, during the last years of the 20th century and is today one of the most densely populated areas of the city. However, from the outset, it faced a series of problems resulting from the lack of public services and infrastructure.

By contrast, Riveras de Occidente emerged in response to the illegal settlement of vacant lots. The Caja de la Vivienda Popular led a process that started with the parceling of these lots, which were then provided with public services, in a process involving growth units that helped resolve the housing problems in the area. This situation produced two completely separate communities which, in turn, because of the presence of the dividing element of the canal, led to the progressive deterioration of the area. Over time, it became a repository of waste and garbage, becoming unsafe and increasingly frequented by drug dealers and criminals.

Figure 11_ Don Carlos, one of the representatives of the JAC, on a day organized to water the plants growing on the banks of the canal (March 2023). Source: Photography by Orlando Antonio Mora.

As a response to this problem, at the beginning of 2020, the JAC and residents joined together to appropriate the space and win it back from the criminals. They started by cleaning the banks of the canal, before planting a variety of plants, not only to beautify the spaces, but also to educate younger residents. Thus, what had started as a one-off project crossed the canal, encouraging more people to get involved. Today, a network of small orchards and gardens has enhanced the value of the area, fostering interaction not only between the inhabitants of the sector, but also their relations with their neighbors who live on the other side of the canal.

Figure 12_ Reused tires used as planters, painted and embellished to provide a fresh face to the banks of the canal (March 2023). Source: Photography by Orlando Antonio Mora.

Figure 13 and 14_ Hand-painted messages in red and yellow, the colors of the flag of Bogotá, in order to encourage recycling, adorn the low walls bordering the canal (March 2023). Source: Photographs by Orlando Antonio Mora.

Jointly with local youth groups, the JAC organizes regular collective work days (known as mingas) in part to advance collective activities, but also to raise awareness and educate local residents and visitors from other neighborhoods. It should be mentioned that no one is paid for their work and that not all residents participate in or support the process, either for lack of interest or lack of time. Most of these projects are self-financed as no agreement has been signed with the district authorities.

During the discussions with the people behind the project, it became clear that the different interventions along the banks of the canal were not only intended to beautify the area, but also to strengthen the social fabric through gardening and the recuperation and appropriation of public spaces. It is for this reason that the presence of ornamental and aromatic plants predominates; the principal objective is not food production, but the recovery of values, knowledge, and traditional rural practices, such as the use of certain herbs as home remedies.

conclusion

Today's progressive thinking comes not only from cultural managers and people involved in artistic projects, but also from the general public. Interventions of the kind described in this paper illustrate different ways in which communities have appropriated communal spaces in processes in which nature—in the form of gardens and orchards—play an important role. Martella quotes a letter from the gardener Jorn de Prècy⁸ addressed to his friend, the writer Hermann Hesse in 1913:

This idea will seem naive to you, dear Hermann. Never forget that nature has always come to our aid. Although it cannot cure our "mal de vivre", it calms, softens, tries to restore a balance in us by reminding us of its place. And continually, like a mother, it renews its care (Martella 2020, 69).

The act of creating urban orchards and gardens not only requires a physical place in which they can be developed, but also the time, training, tools and organization required to cultivate the particular plants that are being grown, be they ornamentals, aromatics, fruit trees, or something else. Although the state encourages this type of activity through campaigns and policy initiatives, it does not allow us to think of them as practices that encourage the linking of different sectors of society or to propose models based on self-management and cooperation that lead to alternative models of life and social organization. On the contrary, they are seen as leisure activities which—in the cases presented here—require participants to invest their own resources if they are to continue.

Gardens lend identity to the place; they are appropriated by inhabitants and are of more importance for their aesthetic value than for producing objects of consumption. It is in this context that orchards and gardens can foster spaces capable of constructing social fabric, where solidarity, autonomy, security and dignity are encouraged. Although these activities are initially influenced by processes proper to consumer society, responding to the specific needs of the moment such as the provision of certain types of food, they also constitute a popular activity. They materialize the way in which members of those communities understand and perceive their world, raising awareness, sensitizing and transmitting values to other members of society.

bibliography

1. Cerić, Teodor. 2018. Jardines en tiempos de guerra. Barcelona: Elba.
2. De la Carrera, Fernando. 2015. "Rejalópolis: Ciudad de Fronteras". Revista Escala (232): 14-27. https://delacarreracavanzo.com/wp-content/uploads/2018/05/Rejalopolis.pdf.
3. Garzón Méndez, Farid J. 2020. "La huerta urbana en Bogotá: Interpretaciones y modos de hacer". Tesis de pregrado en Sociología, Universidad Santo Tomas de Aquino, Bogotá. https://repository.usta.edu.co/handle/11634/34913.
4. Greenpeace. 2020. "Situación actual del espacio público verde en Bogotá". chrome-extension://efaidnbmnnnibpcajpcglclefindmkaj/https://www.greenpeace.org/static/planet4-colombia-stateless/f35550fa-deficit_areas_verdes_ajustado.pdf
5. Harvey, David. 2015. "Construcción rebelde del territorio". Entrevista a David Harvey en El Trébol por Arquitectura Expandida, Bogotá, febrero 15. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=EItp4Ilcjnc&t=79s&ab_channel=TerritoriosLuchas
6. Jung, Carl. 1969. El hombre y sus símbolos. Barcelona: Caralt editores.
7. Martella, Marco. 2020. Un pequeño mundo, un mundo perfecto. Barcelona: Elba.
8. Mayorga Cárdenas, Miguel y María Pía Fontana. (2021). "París, Estocolmo y Barcelona: ciudades con un urbanismo que piensa en las personas". BBC News Mundo (15 de abril). https://www.bbc.com/mundo/noticias-56747117.

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