Everyday day growing cultures: connecting communities through data
Farida VisResearch Fellow, Information School
University of Sheffield
@flygirltwo
Everyday Growing Cultures in the North of England: participation, citizenship and local economies.
Farida Vis (PI – Sheffield)Peter Jackson (CoI – Sheffield)Andrew Miles (CoI – Manchester)Erinma Ochu (CoI – Manchester)Yana Manyukhina (RA – Leeds)Ian Humphrey (RA – Sheffield)
+Steven Flower (ODM)Ric Roberts (ODM)Caroline Ward (SN/BBC)
Bringing together two ‘communities’ in Manchester and Sheffield – who to focus on? Growing communities
• plot holders; allotment societies; those waiting for plots; allotment governing bodies
• Local organisations
• Others (AAA/Diggers)
Open data communities
• open data activists; developers; local government; data journalists
• Central government (DCLG)• Local organisations
NB –> digital transformation through vacant lot mapping?
UK’s open data portal for government data
What’s it all about?
• Help people understand how government works• How policies are made• In one place – searchable• Easier for people to make decisions • Making suggestion about government policies – based on detailed information• Hear more about the Government’s Transparency agenda
Easier for people to make decisions?!
Open data project from Kirklees Council and Thumbprint Co-operative, funded by NESTA's Make It Local programme
But what happens when the funding runs out?
Allotment (publics): an open data and data driven journalism perspective
Farida Vis and Yana Manyukhina University of Sheffield and Leicester | Open Data Manchester
What is an allotment?
Small piece of land rented from the council for the cultivation of fruit and vegetables for home consumption. Sign a tenancy agreement every year.
Since the Allotments Act of 1908 a standard allotment is ‘10 rods’. Rods are also called poles or perches. 10 rod = 250 sqm.
Allotment data as ‘really useful’ data
People care about growing vegetables
Project overview
Not funded (huge advantage) – multiple (experimental) methods used
From the beginning strong engagement outside academia
Allotments Act of 1908: Clause 23 ensures that councils provide allotments. It takes six citizens. Responsibility of local government. If sites sold money can only be spent on allotments.
Spring 2011, the Department for Communities and Local Government issued a public consultation on 1294 Statutory Duties pertaining to local authorities to possibly reduce their number.
These duties included Section 23 of the 1908 Allotments Act, which ensures local authorities provide allotments, causing some newspapers to suggest that ‘The Good Life’ was now under threat.
Bewilderingly difficult survey to find and fill out. Engagement?
The Act remained unchanged however in the summer the government announced that of the 6,103 responses received nearly half contained a comment on the Allotments Act.
Threat to the Allotments Act
Huge waiting lists: big demand, tiny supply
In 1940s: 1.4 million allotment plots in the UK. Now: 200,000. Cycles of popularity. What do
you do when everyone wants one again?
Waiting list crisis (our local site): 12 years ago, waiting list was 2 months.Now: 15 years. Lots of people with children want to grow food with them.
Transition Town West Kirby (TTWK), Margaret Campbell
Grow Your Own | Land Share initiative | guerrilla gardening | alleyway gardens
Recent changes – rent increases, water rates, tenancy agreements
Sources of information on allotments in UK
Allotment Regeneration Initiative (ARI) – official body, policy documents, mentors and advice
National Society for Allotments and Leisure Gardeners (NSALG) – official body
Perennial problem: good allotment data. Difficult to get an overview of what is going on at local/national level.
Evidenced based policy making on allotments difficult
Transition Town West Kirby (TTWK) – waiting lists
Collecting data = time consuming (mainly not available). Not precise
Location data doesn’t tell you very much
Mapping plots in Manchester – AMAS (incomplete) + Trafford (open data of allotment locations released by the council)
Allotment data: focus on unreliable waiting list data (difficult to collect & track)New maps using TTWK FOI data: http://www.transitiontownwestkirby.org.uk/
Enriching existing data
Allotment data: difficult to collect & track (focus on unreliable waiting list data)New maps using TTWK FOI data: http://www.transitiontownwestkirby.org.uk/
New data (through FOI) – From all UK councils.
Tenancy agreements
Changes | consultations
Cost of hiring a plot(past, current, future)
Cost of water use
Discounts
Cost of waste removal
New data obtained through FOI: rent, water charges, discounts, tenancy agreements http://www.whatdotheyknow.com/user/farida_vis_and_yana_manyukhina
Stories in the data | data driven journalism
Data displayed on interactive map – How did your council compare?
Mainstream media interest: about growing vegetables, not open data
Strong interest from the horticultural and allotment communities
Responses to the project
OSM community in West Midlands
http://blog.mappa-mercia.org/2012/01/west-midlands-allotments.html
Strong interest from the open data and policy communities
Problem with truly engaging with participants/end users: methods
participant / hobbyist open data activist / ex allotment committee / ...
‘The allotment data work struck a chord with the workshop as it is a prime example of
useful data concerning a topic that genuinely engages the public’
Full report: http://www.w3.org/2012/06/pmod/report
Quite a few responses via email. For example (on old measurements):
… The Rod was phased out as a legal unit of measurement as part of a ten-year metrication process that began in May 1965 but metrication has often been ignored and, in many instances, imperial measurements prevail: roads are measured in miles and yards; we measure our height in feet and inches and weight in stones and pounds; and it is difficult to change football goal posts from 8 yards x 8 feet to their metric equivalent. Some measurements changed from imperial to metric and back again: farms have reverted from Hectares to Acres and office rents from £x per square metre to £y per square foot. Sometimes we use even older measurements: the length of a cricket pitch between stumps is 1 chain (22 yards) horse races are run over furlongs (220 yards); and, one peculiarity, railway bridges have a metal plaque on the side of their brick or stone arches stating x miles and y chains from Victoria, Waterloo, etc. Now, I work in metric units every day but, in some cases, old measurements are not transferable: 10 square rods means something, 253
Your research into Allotments is not complete: it concentrates on Councils' charges and waiting lists. It does not include anything about their history; there is no reference to Rods, Poles and Perches.
Central Government
Allotment Associations
Local Government
Allotment secretaries
Allotment Officers
Plotholders
Who has / will give you the data?
Everyday Growing Cultures in the North of England: participation, citizenship and local economies.
Farida Vis (PI – Sheffield)Peter Jackson (CoI – Sheffield)Andrew Miles (CoI – Manchester)Erinma Ochu (CoI – Manchester)Yana Manyukhina (RA – Leeds)Ian Humphrey (RA – Sheffield)
+Steven Flower (ODM)Ric Roberts (ODM)Caroline Ward (SN/BBC)
Bringing together two ‘communities’ in Manchester and Sheffield – who to focus on? Growing communities
• plot holders; allotment societies; those waiting for plots; allotment governing bodies
• Local organisations
• Others (AAA/Diggers)
Open data communities
• open data activists; developers; local government; data journalists
• Central government (DCLG)• Local organisations
NB –> digital transformation through vacant lot mapping?
Very limited data
Trafford allotments mapped: http://bobop.co.uk/posts/10-Trafford-Open-Data-Maps
Commonalities: ideas of knowledge sharing, collaboration,
‘the commons’: shared digital/land accessible resources.
• What does digital engagement and transformation look like within these communities? (main question)
• How can these communities further the national open data agenda so that it benefits citizens?
• How can a more widely adopted and enacted open data strategy benefit local economies?
• If unsuccessful in these aspects, what might open data’s unintended consequences look like?
• How can we think of forms of resistance, mobilisation of local histories and heritage identities?
• How can we rethink received ideas of participation and enacting citizenship in light of these?
Data collection/Methods/Outputs/Engagement
• Updating UK allotment dataset• Mapping workshops + tours (mapping vacant lots)• Grow Your Own Data Hackday(s)• Short film (made by Squirrel Nation/BBC) • Website including toolkit
MadLabHack/makers space
Threat to Act -> release useful data
For critical consideration • What’s with all the mapping? Neo-cartography + activism
• Defining ‘community’: ‘In contrast a focus on the role of sociality in the production of Cittaslow ‘places’ indicates how social relationships or ‘bonds’ are implicated in the forms of individual and collective human agency and creativity through which the social and material elements of urban contexts are constituted’ (Pink, 2008: 185 – our emphasis)
• Community-based participatory research: a guide to ethical principles and practice – role of power (ethical principles: mutual respect; equality and inclusion; democratic participation; active learning; making a difference; collective action; personal integrity) (see http://www.dur.ac.uk/beacon/socialjustice/ethics_consultation/)
Open Government Data Camp: Eurohack
Look no maps ->
Google Fusion Tables
GIS OSM
More mapping: OSM communityrespond to Allotment DataNB - Free volunteermapping
Reflecting on past allotment data mapping
Easier for people to make decisions?!
Project website (under construction) #growingcultureshttp://everydaygrowingcultures.org/Allotment data website (in need of TLC – covered in weeds)http://allotmentdata.org/ | @allotmentdata
Farida Vis | [email protected] |@flygirltwo
Andrew Miles - @AGMcatErinma Ochu - @erinmaochuSteven Flower - @stevieflowRic Roberts - @RicRobertsCaroline Ward - @noveltyshoe