Common Ground’s
Rules for Local Distinctiveness

Bloomfield Community Orchard,
Bath, Somerset

Peter Andrews, one of the founders of the Community Orchard, emphasises the importance in any project of the involvement of the other plotholders. He suggests you will also need understanding and backing from the Allotment Authority which may be the local council.

At Bloomfield, the allotments were underused and there was concern that they may be lost to development, so several plotholders mooted the idea of a Community Orchard for 3 or 4 plots out of about 150. They negotiated with the plotholders, asked the Council to come and talk to them and see what they were planning and with agreement from the council, and having posted notices on all the plots, the group effort of creating the orchard began. Not every plotholder was involved in the practical work but all were involved in coming to the decision to go ahead.

Apple Day is celebrated there every year come rain or shine. He feels that the more people who use and visit allotments the better – it’s much harder for a Council to dispose of allotments if every plot is held and as well as those people, more people in the area would fight to keep them.

There is now a waiting list for allotments in the area, the orchard may well have been part of the process of raising their profile and demonstrating how fulfilling allotment gardening is. Peter considers the orchard to be a flagship for the whole allotment site, increasing their value and ownership in the community, which in turn helping to prevent vandalism.

They are also a safeguard. Although the very nature of allotments means that if the orchard falls into disuse in many years to come, it may be cut down and returned to allotments, but the land will still be there. He hopes that the orchard will be increasingly valued, after the current plotholders have gone so that no one would wish to remove it in the future.