Edible York is a charity that has helped to bloom a network of edible community gardens. Abundance, their annual urban harvest project, gets volunteers picking and redistributing surplus fruit across the city. This year, they will also recruit and train volunteers to care for fruit tree sites at the Route 66 Community Garden, Leeman Road Community Orchard, and Alex Lyon House Garden.

Clifton Backies is a nature reserve that supports a rich array of wildlife. The Friends of Clifton Backies (FoCB) have been maintaining and enhancing this area for over 20 years; their dedicated team of volunteers run litter picks, pond dips, bat and butterfly walks and work closely with the local council and community. They are using GGS funds to create a storage space near the site so that they can extend their volunteering activities and engage more volunteers.

York Travellers Trust is a community-led organisation that has been working with, and supporting, the Gypsy and Traveller communities in and around York for more than 30 years. Taking place at and around the Travellers’ site in Clifton, their growing project will enhance green spaces in and around the site, provide free and easy access to fresh vegetables, and encourage residents to take advantage of the physical and mental health benefits of gardening.

A local group is revamping an unloved patch of land beside Southlands Methodist Church to create a community garden for local residents to meet, relax, play, learn about sustainable living and grow edible produce for Planet Food’s pay-as-you-feel café. The space will complete the green corridor between Rowntree Park and Millthorpe School and provide a resting space on the way to the shops.

The Lanes Community Garden committee are transforming a derelict plot in Clifton into a lush urban garden with raised beds, fruit trees and bushes, herbs, and flowers. Funding from Growing Green Spaces will help them to fully reinvigorate the site and recruit local volunteers, making the garden into a space where the community can come together, learn, and grow. 

Led by Flower Power, Greening the Groves will support Groves residents to grow beautiful flowers and herbs by holding weekly gardening sessions. They’ll support volunteers to develop knowledge and skills to transform unused public spaces into places for all to enjoy and turn empty beds, neglected walls and scruffy planters in public areas into celebrated green spaces. 

St Nicks are keeping Millennium Fields buzzing with biodiversity and wildlife. Their weekly meadowkeeping sessions are connecting the cluster of volunteer groups working in the area and teaching new volunteers scything and sowing skills to conserve and enhance this valuable habitat and resource for the local community.

Woodthorpe Community Group are a long-standing organisation for residents who have revitalised the local play area and planted bulbs around the neighbourhood. A small grant from GGS will enable them to get the community planting to create a riot of colour along Woodthorpe’s verges.

The Friends of Glen Gardens’ aim is to preserve, manage and develop this Green Flag Award-winning park in Heworth. They are using GGS funding to create Keith’s Wood - a woodland garden with native flowers, shrubs and trees that will provide food and shelter for a range of wildlife. A wheelchair friendly path will wind through the area.

The Conservation Volunteers (TCV) have added colour and life to the park by building a dedicated Thursday volunteering group who tend the rose beds and raised beds. With GGS funding, they have transformed the park’s food-growing area, making it fully accessible to wheelchair users. Continued funding is allowing them to sustain the Thursday group and grow their new food growing volunteer group.

Bishophillbillies was formed when a group of local residents joined forces to renovate the churchyard on Bishophill Senior into a thriving community garden. With its wild areas and community composting, the garden is now a hub for wildlife and cultural events. Their grant is going towards a neighbourhood greening project that will fill the streets of Bishophill with plants, flowers, protected pollinator zones, sensory gardens and street planters.

Dodsworth Residents’ Association (DARA) are giving a neglected piece of land at the end of a junction between Pottery Lane and Dodsworth Avenue a green makeover by planting fruit trees and bushes. With GGS funds, they will establish a regular volunteering group who will enhance the space further.

The York Unifying Multicultural Initiative's (YUMI) International Community Garden is a tranquil place where people from different cultures come together to grow, cook, share and celebrate food from around the world. With GGS funding, they will expand these activities.

The Friends of Rowntree Park are responsible for an incredible range of activities in the park, including their regular volunteer gardening group. GGS funding has enabled them to hire a volunteer co-ordinator to organise and expand their gardening, wellbeing, environmental and cultural initiatives.