T hoch 3

Community gardens are key building blocks of a socially just, health-promoting and climate-resilient city, due to their statutory mandate and historically evolved structures. Their potential, however, is currently underutilised. The "T hoch 3" project therefore aims to make community gardens more accessible to their surrounding communities through a low-threshold approach that is suitable for everyday use. The aim is to create health-promoting and heat-adapted usage options for different population groups, thereby strengthening social participation. The project focuses on reducing legal, organisational, spatial and socio-cultural barriers that currently hinder shared use.

To achieve this, the project team establishes a participatory real-world laboratory, bringing together different dialogue groups: students from a secondary school in the City of Bochum, residents of a local senior care facility and members of the community garden association. Based on an integrated analysis of existing conditions, needs, and barriers, the project team considers socio-spatial and climatic conditions as well as organisational and legal-institutional frameworks, while also incorporating the participants' perspectives and needs. Within the real-world laboratory, the project jointly explores how the community garden can be opened up, used, and designed as a low-threshold learning, meeting, and experiential space. The focus is on collaborative forms of use, participatory engagement activities, and the question of what requirements need to be met for an inclusive, accessible, and needs-oriented garden space.

This intergenerational exchange connects different perspectives and requirements – providing the foundation for jointly developing and testing real-world experiments. The project team scientifically evaluates the impacts and translates the findings into transferable formats and recommendations for action, in order to support municipalities, community garden associations and other stakeholders in similar transformation processes.

The Wuppertal Institute contributes its expertise in transformative research, real-world laboratories, and at the intersection of climate adaptation, sustainable urban development and social innovation. The researchers implement the project in the City of Bochum in collaboration with Friederika e. V., a local community garden association. The associated partners (Hans-Böckler-Realschule, SBO Senioreneinrichtungen – Haus am Glockengarten, and Stadtverband Bochum der Kleingärtner) support the project by contributing their specific expertise, providing access to relevant target groups, and actively participating in the project process.

As an implementation pioneer of the InnovationCommunity Urban Health (ICUH), the "T hoch 3" project contributes to advancing innovative approaches at the interface of urban development, health and climate adaptation. The project is funded within the framework of the DATIpilot funding guideline of the German Federal Ministry of Research, Technology and Space (abbreviated BMFTR, per its German name), with support from the Project Management Jülich at Forschungszentrum Jülich GmbH.