Doreen Ashby, 81, Kiln Row
Forty winters I wore my coat indoors. Last January I sat in my own front room in a cardigan.
Doreen Ashby — warm homes job no. 0847, fitted November 2025
Portwell's community climate charity
Autumn 2026 · Season 8
Common Ground is 2,931 neighbours doing three unglamorous jobs in the parts of Portwell with the least shade, the worst flooding and the coldest houses. We turn up on Saturdays, we publish every number, and we go where the need is measured rather than where the photographs are best.
94%
of the trees we planted in 2023 are alive after two summers. The city average for new street trees is 71%.
What we do
Each programme starts from a map of need rather than a wish list: the streets with the least shade, the drains that back up first, the homes that lose the most heat.
We plant where canopy cover is under 12%. Pits cut, guards fitted, and three summers of watering booked before a single tree goes in.
4,812trees planted since 2019 How we choose streets 02 · WaterKerbside beds that take the run-off from the road before it reaches a drain. Each one holds around 30,000 litres in a heavy storm.
63gardens holding 1.9m litres See how one is built 03 · HomesLoft insulation, draught-proofing and heat pumps, free to households on low incomes and fitted by our own four crews.
£412average yearly saving What a retrofit involvesSince 2019
Every tree carries a tag number, every garden has a drainage survey, every home has a before-and-after bill. These are the totals to the end of 2025.
4,812
Street trees planted, 94% of them still standing
63
Flood gardens holding 1.9 million litres per storm
£472k
Taken off energy bills in 1,146 homes last winter
18.4k
Volunteer hours in 2025, given by 2,931 people
Our crews can reach 210 more households on the waiting list before January, if the money is in by the end of November. Every pound given to this appeal goes on materials and fitting.
What a gift does, in one home
Doreen Ashby, 81, Kiln Row
Forty winters I wore my coat indoors. Last January I sat in my own front room in a cardigan.
Doreen Ashby — warm homes job no. 0847, fitted November 2025
Turn up
No experience, no kit and no commitment beyond the day itself. Under-16s are welcome with an adult, and every session ends with tea.
Your street could be next
Give three hours on a Saturday or £8 a month. Either one puts a tree in the ground on a street that has been waiting for it since before we started counting.