The day begins with the gardening club and 10am (although Jill has already been hard at work weeding for a while). There’s a list of tasks that need doing and Debbie talks it through. There’s also some news – the local Asda has agreed to donate plants that they can’t sell if someone can pick them up each week. The plants will need some TLC, but no one doubts there’s plenty of that to be had. B&Q have offered to donate items as well. Somebody has offered to paint signs in Arabic as a visible acknowledgement of that section of the community.  And Castle Hill Hospital are donating some compost bins and wooden pallets. They’ll be delivered later. The pallets are going to be made into bird boxes by school children at workshops on the park. The hospital would like a few in return.  

People agree to tasks. Some go off with a wheelbarrow to find dead wood for a bug hotel. I walk around with Barry the leader of the gardening volunteer group. Since I was last here the raised beds have changed beyond recognition. Then they were just being built. Now they are full of lush growth – potatoes, peas, tomatoes, onions, radishes. There are herbs too and as I walk past I rub them with my fingers and smell the thyme, sage and lavender. I ask Barry if he’s eaten nasturtiums – leaves or flowers – in a salad. He hasn’t and tries a leaf. I watch his face as it releases its pepperiness – he likes it.  

It’s gorgeously sunny. John used to be the mayor during theyear that Hull was the City of Culture. He offers bricks from his garden. He tells me of his vision for the park – a place that belongs to the community, busy and thriving, with sports facilities and a café. He didn’t get all the support he’d hoped for back in 2017, but the vision is still alive and even without the cash injection the park is unrecognisable from the derelict place it used to be.  

I’m asked if I have any ideas how to improvise some screening to separate the park beds from the neighbour’s garden. I suggest asking B&Q if that could be their donation and Debbie whizzes off a message to her contact at the store.  

The university have commissioned Paul Richardson to make a film about the Ideas Fund and its impact on the park. He wants to interview Debbie, but everyone wants to talk to her. He’s set up in a spot by a bench in front of some beautiful yellow roses. She’s not coming. She’s giving some sticks of rhubarb to some passers-by, and talking to them about an upcoming meeting with members of Cooperation Hull, who want to get people talking about what matters to them in the community. Paul paces back and forth, but eventually Debbie is ready.  

The wind has picked up and someone is strimming in the nearby street, but he thinks the sound will be OK. Debbie talks about the park and what the Ideas Fund has allowed FOAK to do. She is passionate and excited about the possibilities. After the interview we walk over to the Food Bank with a wheelbarrow full of vegetable and Paul asks Debbie for some hair advice. There’s no one available to take the veg at the food bank so we bring it back again, but Paul is happy with his footage. The sun has gone in and it’s getting cool. The compost bins are delivered from the hospital just as Paul is about to interview me for his film. It’s too noisy, so he goes to help carry the pallets instead.  

Debbie shows me an area of the park which is the council has agreed can be cultivated for growing vegetables. It’s huge. Some decisions need to be made – how to fence it, protect it, allow access to it, how to source the plants –  but there’s space to grow enough vegetables to feed a lot of people. It could make a real difference.. 

Eventually Paul manages to interview me. He has enough footage and leaves.  

At 1pm the plants are delivered from Asda and the volunteer group begins to arrive. Some are having safeguarding training at the Food Bank today, so it’s a depleted group. Debbie has a question for everyone – what do you want from a FOAKP website? What would make you go to look at it? What information would be useful? Some teenagers arrive. They normally come to a later session but they’ve finished their GCSEs and now are free in the daytime. We chat about recent challenges and joys, then Debbie tasks the young people with sourcing a speaker online, as well as some garden screens. She gives them a credit card and access to her Amazon account. They rise to the challenge and find what she needs.  

There’s a lot of coming and going. Marek the mural artist bobs by. More teenagers arrive for the afternoon session. Someone sets a fire in the dog park and we all run to put it out. The perpetrators run away and the young people come up with suggestions for how to identify them and track them down. Debbie defuses the conversation and asks the kids to put up the gazebos for the art session. Because the forecast was good she’d decided to do it outside. The weather hasn’t been paying attention though because now it’s raining. It’s chilly too and the gazebos strain in the wind, almost blowing away. There’s a game of jenga going on, but as soon as it’s finished someone suggests going inside, and there’s an immediate rush to take everything in. 

Back in the pavilion the young people dance. They put their legs through the sleeves of their hoodies and have races crouching like gnomes. Debbie has a go as well. Everyone gets the giggles.  

There’s a meeting planned for six. The plan had been for that to be underneath the gazebos too, but it’s properly raining now. The sort of rain that keeps people inside their houses – and only a couple of people turn up. Somebody wants to talk about drains, and someone else says there are homeless people camping on the ridge. Debbie offers to take them some food.  

We’re all done by seven o’clock. Debbie locks up the pavilion and we head home. It seems a long time since we arrived in the morning. A lot has been achieved, and a lot of people have passed through the park. It’s felt like a day spent at the heart of the community.