It's been a while since we had a review and as we've seen some substantial increases on some sites it seems like a good time for another review.
For this year's growing season please say how much you pay, how big your plot is (or the pole rate if you know it), and any details like water or administration charged seperately at a flat rate, etc, and I'll do a running analysis of the effective pole-rate. Cheers.
I'll kick off:
£6.94/pole
£10 per annum this year...my plot is 25m long and 10m wide.....not a clue how many poles that is...maybe somebody could enlighten me please?
The £10 rent covers everything apart from manure.Last year the manure was £18 for a big trailer load dropped at the end of your plot.
ours are 22p per square metre as all the plots ars different sizes, includes manure and lime. most come with sheds, for people who haven't a polytunnel, a piece in the communal one. It has been that price for 5 years, we've had to bring in water butts as there is a water problem with the club :)
£2.35/pole. But then, this is Lincolnshire, we have land coming out our ears.
22p a sq m (above post) equates to £6.06 a pole
We are static at £24 per 10 pole plot, water included. :)
thanks for that ;D
Quote from: lincsyokel2 on April 03, 2011, 16:25:44
£2.35/pole. But then, this is Lincolnshire, we have land coming out our ears.
22p a sq m (above post) equates to £6.06 a pole
We pay 84p per linear metre and looking at the bills for our two plots it says one is 28 metres and the other 26 metres didn't realise there was 2 metres difference as there isn't >:( one's about 2 foot wider than the other but that doesn't count ::)
We have water and that's it.
We've built our own sheds etc ,buy our own manure and if we want to buy seeds, compost or other stuff we have to join the horticultural society £6 annually 'cos they own the hut :(
i pay 5 quid per annum and its 20 poles
i pay £35 for a 60 foot by 45 foot allotment =2700 sqr feet
Quote from: macmac on April 03, 2011, 17:14:28
We pay 84p per linear metre and looking at the bills for our two plots it says one is 28 metres and the other 26 metres didn't realise there was 2 metres difference as there isn't >:( one's about 2 foot wider than the other but that doesn't count ::)
We have water and that's it.
We've built our own sheds etc ,buy our own manure and if we want to buy seeds, compost or other stuff we have to join the horticultural society £6 annually 'cos they own the hut :(
Hi Macmac, how wide are the plots please as best as you can guess?
Quote from: Fork on April 03, 2011, 15:38:14
£10 per annum this year...my plot is 25m long and 10m wide.....not a clue how many poles that is...maybe somebody could enlighten me please?
The £10 rent covers everything apart from manure.Last year the manure was £18 for a big trailer load dropped at the end of your plot.
That's 10 poles Fork. 25m
2==1 pole
Quote from: manicscousers on April 03, 2011, 16:01:23
ours are 22p per square metre as all the plots ars different sizes, includes manure and lime. most come with sheds, for people who haven't a polytunnel, a piece in the communal one. It has been that price for 5 years, we've had to bring in water butts as there is a water problem with the club :)
That's £5.50/pole manics - 1 pole=25m
2.
Quote from: jimtheworzel on April 03, 2011, 17:34:58
i pay £35 for a 60 foot by 45 foot allotment =2700 sqr feet
That's a tad shy of 10 poles Jim at £3.53/pole.
I have a full plot (approx 19ft wide x 140ft long) and the rent has gone up by £1 this year ("due to the high water charges") to £19 + £2 association membership fee. Its my first year of paying (last year as my first on an uncultivated plot was free ;D), but from memory of the fee from my last plot a few years ago I think it's gone up by about a £1 a year over the last few years and the water bill is usually to blame.
Quote from: Unwashed on April 03, 2011, 18:08:13
Quote from: Fork on April 03, 2011, 15:38:14
£10 per annum this year...my plot is 25m long and 10m wide.....not a clue how many poles that is...maybe somebody could enlighten me please?
The £10 rent covers everything apart from manure.Last year the manure was £18 for a big trailer load dropped at the end of your plot.
That's 10 poles Fork. 25m2==1 pole
1 pole = 16.5 feet, the length of a horse and plough from the horses nose to the ploughmans heels. Apole is both a unit of length and area
16.5 feet = 5.5 yards = 5.0292 metres
So as area
1 pole = 5.5 x 5.5 = 30.25 sq yards or 272 sq/ft
1 pole = 5.0292 x 5.0292 = 25.29 sq metres
Hi unwashed one's 20' wide the other 22'.
I believe that all the one's in wsm are priced ('tho perhaps not measured :() the same,we are self managed but I think we follow council prices.
This is a very interesting thread thanks for starting it .
If you can measure the width of a typical plot to better than +/-10cm you're doing extremely well considering how ill-defined plot edges can be and how paths can meander, so that gives a fractional error on the measured area of +/-2%, so 25m2==1 pole is quite accurate enough, and it has the advantage of being convenient.
League Table £/pole
flitwickone £0.25
Fork £1.00
sazhig £1.94
lincsyokel2 £2.35
saddad £2.40
macmac £3.33
jimtheworzel £3.53
manicscousers £5.50
Unwashed £6.94
I'm 90% confident that the average rent is in the range £1.94 - £4.11, and most likely it's £3.03.
This was last year's analysis (http://this%20was%20last%20year's%20analysis). If you pay a concessionary rate can you please quote the full rate to make the analysis fair. Thanks.
£2.85/pole
£2.50/pole
£30 for a 25 x 7 meter ish plot, plus a 7 x 7 meter ish bit at the top that has my greenhouse, shed and compost bins on, water included but that's it..
League Table £/pole
BoardStupid £1.70
sazhig £1.94
lincsyokel2 £2.35
saddad £2.40
pumpkinlover £2.50
nodig £2.85
macmac £3.33
steve76 £3.35
jimtheworzel £3.53
manicscousers £5.50
newtona2 £6.00
Unwashed £6.94
PJW_Letchworth £11.20
I'm 90% confident that the average rent is in the range £2.52 - £4.79, and most likely it's £3.66.
Our society owns it's land..after member is purchased his plot in a from of shares..he only pays £6 per year membership.
So..I've got 2 plots..that 40poles and about £50 =once a 'life time' payment and then 2x£6 per year.
I don't know how you are going to fit that in your survey ::)
Quote from: goodlife on April 03, 2011, 22:33:48
Our society owns it's land..after member is purchased his plot in a from of shares..he only pays £6 per year membership.
So..I've got 2 plots..that 40poles and about £50 =once a 'life time' payment and then 2x£6 per year.
I don't know how you are going to fit that in your survey ::)
No, that's tricky isn't it. What happens if the member quits her allotments, does she sell her shares to anyone else?
Mines £6.40 per pole
6 poles= £38.40
+95p water charge
6 poles = £5.70
Total= £44.10
Ours is currently £28 per year for a full-size plot (25ft. x 130ft) which includes water.
It is going up in stages from October this year -
Oct. 2011 - £40
Oct. 2012 - £60
Oct. 2013 - £75
Mine's £5.75 a rod - not sure how this equates to poles but think may be around £5.60???
Mine is 60 feet by 40 feet I thought it was going up this year after miss use of water by some people , but it stayed the same at £5.00 inc water.
Our standard rent for a 5 pole plot in 2011 is £14, i.e. £2.80 per pole. This includes water.
In 2010 the rent was £11, i.e. £2.20 per pole. So, the increase in 2011 was circa. 27%.
£2.60 per pole, plus a £5 surcharge for NSALG & insurance (per member, ie. regardless of how much land is rented).
Car park, secure fencing & gates, water on or near every plot, composting toilet, newsletter, free machinery, manure, pallets, bark chippings.
Quote from: Squash64 on April 04, 2011, 05:49:54
Ours is currently £28 per year for a full-size plot (25ft. x 130ft) which includes water.
It is going up in stages from October this year -
Oct. 2011 - £40
Oct. 2012 - £60
Oct. 2013 - £75
ERDINGTON AND SUTTON COLDFIELD
Our years rent is £3 per pole up to 7 Poles, (177sqm) 50% reduction over 60 or on benefit ,( free rent in the second year if 2/3 cultivated ) water is £7.55 per plot , the association membership also charge this is to cover, insurance , NSALG , use of machinery fuel and maintenance .We have 12 plots in two polytunnels we rent out at £10. We collect rents on behalf of the council and get a 25% discount . All this makes the bills quite complex.... our year starts Jan 1st ,
Quote from: Lottiman on April 04, 2011, 07:09:06
Mine is 60 feet by 40 feet I thought it was going up this year after miss use of water by some people , but it stayed the same at £5.00 inc water.
Hi Lottiman, are you saying your whole 40x60 plot costs you £5.00, or it's £5.00 per pole?
Quote from: Trevor_D on April 04, 2011, 07:50:38
£2.60 per pole, plus a £5 surcharge for NSALG & insurance (per member, ie. regardless of how much land is rented).
Car park, secure fencing & gates, water on or near every plot, composting toilet, newsletter, free machinery, manure, pallets, bark chippings.
Trevor, for the comparison I'll call yours £3.60/pole which is the effective rate for a typical 5 pole plot.
Quote from: picman on April 04, 2011, 10:14:23
Our years rent is £3 per pole up to 7 Poles, (177sqm) 50% reduction over 60 or on benefit ,( free rent in the second year if 2/3 cultivated ) water is £7.55 per plot , the association membership also charge this is to cover, insurance , NSALG , use of machinery fuel and maintenance .We have 12 plots in two polytunnels we rent out at £10. We collect rents on behalf of the council and get a 25% discount . All this makes the bills quite complex.... our year starts Jan 1st ,
Hi picman, as your association membership pays for your site maintenance I'll roll that into your pole rate - what does the association charge?
When you say you get a 25% discount, do you mean as against your council's other sites who don't collect the rents on behalf of the council?
Can't remember what I said last year, it has not increased, do you still have the figures. Our were measured in paces so do vary somewhat, I think it depended on which pair of boots the farmer was wearing.
What happens if the member quits her allotments, does she sell her shares to anyone else?
Association will return the value to the quitter and the new allotment holder will pay the same value to association ..so value stays same..it is only the GH's etc. that is left to negotiation if and how much money chance hands between themselves. ;)
Hello,
Mine is £31.70 includes water.
It's the price given for a 1/2 plot, but mines a bit smaller than a standard half plot, it's 32 feet by 30 feet which I think although I could be wrong is about 4 poles maube jsut under.
Hi there
We pay £2.51 a SM, £38.96 for our half plot, that includes water.
Next year it says the price is going up from £13.50 per 100 sq mtrs to £16.30
Bea
Quote from: Stripeybea on April 04, 2011, 14:07:39
Hi there
We pay £2.51 a SM, £38.96 for our half plot, that includes water.
Next year it says the price is going up from £13.50 per 100 sq mtrs to £16.30
Bea
Hi Stripeybea, sorry, your numbers seem inconsistent. Are you saying you pay £2.51 per square metre, or £0.13 per square meter, or if your half plot is 50 square meters then £0.78 per square metre?
£58/year for full plot in Liverpool - that's without concessions. My plot is not perfectly rectagonal it's around 10 yds wide at the rear and 15 yds wide at the front. It's roughly 30 yds from front to back.
Our site goes in different bands and square meterage.
A plot measuring up to 100 sq meters with no facilities would cost £16.40 per year
Where a plot measuring 276+ square metres with no facilities would cost you £32.50
The same size plots with all facilities, water/fencing/toilets/car park would cost you, £26.85 and £63.75
Hope this is of some help
Quote from: Unwashed on April 04, 2011, 14:51:52
Quote from: Stripeybea on April 04, 2011, 14:07:39
Hi there
We pay £2.51 a SM, £38.96 for our half plot, that includes water.
Next year it says the price is going up from £13.50 per 100 sq mtrs to £16.30
Bea
Hi Stripeybea, sorry, your numbers seem inconsistent. Are you saying you pay £2.51 per square metre, or £0.13 per square meter, or if your half plot is 50 square meters then £0.78 per square metre?
D'Oh
its me reading the invoice wrong :-[
We have 251 square metres so pay £38.96 for the year
Going up next year from £13.50 per 100 sq mtrs to £16.30 for the year
Bea
Quote from: Stripeybea on April 04, 2011, 16:21:24
its me reading the invoice wrong :-[
We have 251 square metres so pay £38.96 for the year
Going up next year from £13.50 per 100 sq mtrs to £16.30 for the year
Bea
I still make £38.96 for 251 square metres more like £15.00 per 100 square meter rather then £13.50. I'm going to call your rate £3.88/pole as that seems to be what you pay.
Quote from: Chloe on April 04, 2011, 15:50:01
Our site goes in different bands and square meterage.
A plot measuring up to 100 sq meters with no facilities would cost £16.40 per year
Where a plot measuring 276+ square metres with no facilities would cost you £32.50
The same size plots with all facilities, water/fencing/toilets/car park would cost you, £26.85 and £63.75
Hope this is of some help
Tell me you pay Chloe and I'll use that as the comparison figure.
League Table £/pole
flitwickone £0.25
goodlife £0.30
lottiman £0.57
Fork £1.00
BoardStupid £1.70
sazhig £1.94
lincsyokel2 £2.35
squash64 £2.35
shirlton £2.35
saddad £2.40
pumpkinlover £2.50
BAK £2.80
nodig £2.85
macmac £3.33
steve76 £3.35
jimtheworzel £3.53
Trevor_D £3.60
Stripeybea £3.88
herring8 £4.68
manicscousers £5.50
Alex133 £5.75
newtona2 £6.00
Digeroo £6.75
cornykey £7.35
Unwashed £6.94
vicki.m £8.99
PJW_Letchworth £11.20
I'm 90% confident that the average rent is in the range £3.03 - £4.69, and most likely it's £3.86.
I'm really suprised mine comes out near the highest price, I thought I was getting a really good deal - mind you I was on the verge of getting one of those £5 a week garden centre ones when I got the letter form the council offering me a plot .
Still not bad Vicki, that's if you work it out per week. :D
Quote from: Unwashed on April 04, 2011, 17:02:21
League Table £/pole
flitwickone £0.25
goodlife £0.30
lottiman £0.57
Fork £1.00
BoardStupid £1.70
sazhig £1.94
lincsyokel2 £2.35
squash64 £2.35
shirlton £2.35
saddad £2.40
pumpkinlover £2.50
BAK £2.80
nodig £2.85
macmac £3.33
steve76 £3.35
jimtheworzel £3.53
Trevor_D £3.60
Stripeybea £3.88
herring8 £4.68
manicscousers £5.50
Alex133 £5.75
newtona2 £6.00
Digeroo £6.75
cornykey £7.35
Unwashed £6.94
vicki.m £8.99
PJW_Letchworth £11.20
I'm 90% confident that the average rent is in the range £3.03 - £4.69, and most likely it's £3.86.
would be interesting to add which county the plots are in, see if theres a reverse north/south divide.
Im in Lincolnshire.
I've just paid the 2010/11 annual bill for my half plot (about 30 by 60 feet) which was £13-25.
Quote from: vicki.m on April 04, 2011, 13:40:14
Hello,
Mine is £31.70 includes water.
It's the price given for a 1/2 plot, but mines a bit smaller than a standard half plot, it's 32 feet by 30 feet which I think although I could be wrong is about 4 poles maube jsut under.
Hi Vicki, 32'x30' is 3.5 poles, and that makes your pole rate £8.99 per pole. If your plot is undersized and you're paying over the odds you might want to talk to your landlord about a rent reduction.
Hi Unwashed. Sorry yes that was £ 5.00 per annum for the whole plot.
I think I've established that I have a 20 pole plot. I pay £11 per year for this (also pay a key deposit and deposit in case we leave it in a state). But £11 is the same price whether you have a full (40 pole) or 1/3 sized plot.
Unwashed update , our membership fee is for machinery maintenance , fuel, replacement etc , the council has responsibly for site maintenance , so not part of pole rate, 25% is available for local associations (9 of 15 sites) who collect the council rent for them , they send me a bill (as treasurer) for all our plots less 25% ( I usually have to tell them what it should be ) ... county is Worcestershire it is complicated but works quite well.
Hi Unwashed,
My plot is 339 sq metres and I pay £62.00.
Our site doesn't have all the facilities.
Chloe
League Table £/pole
flitwickone £0.25
goodlife £0.30
cobnut £0.45
lottiman £0.57
Fork £1.00
BoardStupid £1.70
sazhig £1.94
Flighty £2.00
lincsyokel2 £2.35
squash64 £2.35
shirlton £2.35
saddad £2.40
pumpkinlover £2.50
BAK £2.80
nodig £2.85
macmac £3.33
steve76 £3.35
jimtheworzel £3.53
Trevor_D £3.60
Stripeybea £3.88
picman £4.51
Chloe £4.57
herring8 £4.68
manicscousers £5.50
Alex133 £5.75
newtona2 £6.00
Digeroo £6.75
Unwashed £6.94
cornykey £7.35
vicki.m £8.99
PJW_Letchworth £11.20
I'm 90% confident that the average rent is in the range £2.98 - £4.49, and most likely it's £3.73.
Funnily enough last year's survey gave the average as £4.60 which is significantly higher than this year and that rather flies in the face of the news we hear of substantial increases.
This is what the distribution of rates looks like so far. If you're paying over £7.00/pole you're in the top 10 percent.
(http://www.emilyware.co.uk/earthwork/images/stories/articles/rentfrequencydistribution.jpg)
Keep the rates coming - the more samples, the more accurate the picture. Cheers.
£2 per rod rent, £3 per plot subs/fees
total for 10 rod plot =£23 ( water is charged separately)
Quote from: tonybloke on April 05, 2011, 20:53:30
£2 per rod rent, £3 per plot subs/fees
total for 10 rod plot =£23 ( water is charged separately)
Ah, but how much does the tax-payer subsidise your hobby for you to pay just £2.30/pole? ;)
Quote from: Unwashed on April 05, 2011, 20:59:41
Quote from: tonybloke on April 05, 2011, 20:53:30
£2 per rod rent, £3 per plot subs/fees
total for 10 rod plot =£23 ( water is charged separately)
Ah, but how much does the tax-payer subsidise your hobby for you to pay just £2.30/pole? ;)
erm,
ZILCH
23pounds and 25 pence for 5 poles in Slough. This includes water, toilets, an onsite shop,(although there is a small membership fee yearly for this) regular waste removal and sometimes a lorry load of manure. Rent is the same as last year.
It's amazing how many different types of measurement we use - rods/poles/metres/yards&feet/farmer's feet.....
This is a great survey but without any indication of location bit difficult to compare your own with others.
Quote from: Alex133 on April 06, 2011, 07:02:11
It's amazing how many different types of measurement we use - rods/poles/metres/yards&feet/farmer's feet.....
This is a great survey but without any indication of location bit difficult to compare your own with others.
if you are going to talk land, and you hate the EU, then you have to talk in Poles, Hectares and Acres. I would even use Bovates, Ploughs and Hundreds if i could, except i only know three other people who would understand what i was talking about.
1 sq mi 259.0 hectare
1 Hectare 2.47105 acres and also 395 poles
1 acre 0.4047 hectare and also 160 poles.
1 pole = 16.5 ft and also 272.25 sq/ft
yes, it needs county adding to it, to see if theres a pattern - i suspect the more south you go the more expensive it gets.
Farm-derived units of measurement:
1. The rod is a historical unit of length equal to 5½ yards. It may have originated from the typical length of a mediaeval ox-goad. Also known as a Pole, or a Perch.
2. The furlong (meaning furrow length) was the distance a team of oxen could plough without resting. This was standardised to be exactly 40 rods.
3. An acre was the amount of land tillable by one man behind one ox in one day (4840 sq/yds). Traditional acres were long and narrow (many are 40 poles (70 yds) long, and therefore 4 poles (7 yds) wide!) due to the difficulty in turning the plough.
4. An oxgang, or plough was the amount of land tillable by one ox in a ploughing season. This could vary from village to village, but was typically around 15 acres. This was also reckoned to be the amount of land one family needed to live off.
5. A virgate was the amount of land tillable by two oxen in a ploughing season.
6. A carucate was the amount of land tillable by a team of eight oxen in a ploughing season. This was equal to 8 oxgangs or 4 virgates. Also known as a Hide, or Bovate
7. A Hundred was enough the land to provide 100 men-at-arms to the manor
8. A Wapentake was the same as a hundred in Danelaw.
For comparision, Lincolnshire comprised 27 Hundreds and is approx 2300 sq miles (141,000 acres), giving 5200 acres in a hundred average
you missed out the interesting measurements!
16 sq poles = 1 sq chain
10 sq chain = 1 acre
80 acres = 1 yd of land
100 acres = 1 hide of land
40 hides = 1 barony.
;)
Quote from: tonybloke on April 06, 2011, 22:51:15
you missed out the interesting measurements!
16 sq poles = 1 sq chain
10 sq chain = 1 acre
80 acres = 1 yd of land
100 acres = 1 hide of land
40 hides = 1 barony.
;)
And just to confuse it even more, there was two ways to count acres, depending if you used the Danelaw or the 'english' method. In the Domesday Book, land was measured in Danelaw. The essential difference was that 'english; acres were about 20% larger. This is demonstrated above where you sate 1 hide = 100 acres, whereas we know 1 plough = 15 acres. 8 x 15 = 120. So your acre is a danelaw acre, and my plough is an english plough.
we'll have no truck with the foriegn measure here *waves pitchfork*
you must have been ploughing light land if you can do 15 acres in a season, on heavy land about 10 acres was normal fort a seasons ploughing.
( I still use all imperial measurements, btw)
I pay £13.50 a year for a 5-pole site, but have been told it's going up to £16.00 from January.
Interesting topic.
Just as a comparison, here in BC we pay $17 a year for each plot plus we have to be a member of the garden association to get a plot. So for us now 2 plots plus membership is a little short of $50 dollars, that is for an area of 20 feet x25 feet, that is about 35 sterling.
We can buy wheelbarrow loads of manure for about 2 sterling.
Supplied are all gardening tools, rotatillers and hand tools if we want to use theirs, so we actually don`t need to buy them if we don`t want to.
Hose pipes to every fourth lot, with very long hoses on them.
I also have a long disabled waist high bed which I don`t pay anything for, and I have the large greenhouse which is in a compound where food is grown for the foodbank., well about 8 x 16 ish which I have taken on as a project, it costs me nothing but I do grow transplants which are given out as freebies at work parties, and I shall be growing toms for the oiod bank in it this year too.
We have to do 10 hours of community work on the gardens or pay an extra $50 a year. The greenhouse is my commitment. Others cut the grass, build or repair sheds etc, repair the plunbing put up picnic tables,or usual maintenmance stuff, work on the exec, newsletter etc, We are completely self managed and self financed. The land belongs to Vancouver Parks and is a heritage site, but we are not subsidised at all.
It works very well, I just wish the plots were bigger. We can have up to 6 but only one at a time,so on the waiting list we go and if we make it to the top in one year we get another one..usual thing with waiting lists. We have just got our second.
Very different here.
XX Jeannine
Got it wrong on original posting - 2011 £5.20 rod, 2012 will be £5.75 rod.
League Table £/pole
flitwickone £0.25
goodlife £0.30
cobnut £0.45
lottiman £0.57
Fork £1.00
BoardStupid £1.70
Good Gourd 2 £1.75
sazhig £1.94
Flighty £2.00
tonybloke £2.30
lincsyokel2 £2.35
squash64 £2.35
shirlton £2.35
saddad £2.40
pumpkinlover £2.50
Gadget £2.70
BAK £2.80
nodig £2.85
macmac £3.33
steve76 £3.35
jimtheworzel £3.53
Trevor_D £3.60
Stripeybea £3.88
picman £4.51
Chloe £4.57
Weed-Digga £4.65
herring8 £4.68
Alex133 £5.20
manicscousers £5.50
newtona2 £6.00
Digeroo £6.75
Unwashed £6.94
cornykey £7.35
vicki.m £8.99
PJW_Letchworth £11.20
I'm 90% confident that the average rent is in the range £2.94 - £4.30, and most likely it's £3.62.
I'm afraid it would take an enormous sample to be able to make any kind of regional comparison - with 35 respondents it's only possible to say with any confidence that the national average is somewhere in a £1.40 range. And even if you could collect enough samples, it doesn't tell you anything about any underlying cause for a rate disparity because it doesn't isolate the effect of a regional variation in self-management aganist council management or the level of subsidy.
I think it's worth mentioning the distribution of rents. Statistics is a funny old game and if you want to know how the rent you pay compares with everyone else you'll probably ask if your rent is above average or not. Oftentimes that's the best way of saying, but when the distribution of rents is skewed a better question is whether you pay more or less than the typical allotmenteer.
Here's the distribution of rents, and it turns out in our sample that a quarter of allotmenteers pay less than £2.00/pole, half pay less than £3.00/pole, two thirds pay less than £4.00/pole, and if you pay more than £7.00/pole you're in the top 10%.
(http://www.emilyware.co.uk/earthwork/images/stories/articles/rentfrequencydistribution.jpg)
If you really want to know how your rent compares with sites in your neighbourhood your best bet is simply to phone round or visit the web sites. This is what I did last year to see how Newbury's rent compared with its neighbours. My findings were pretty much the same as this current sample - half the sites pay less than £3.50/pole, a quarter pay less than £2.20/pole, two thirds pay less than £4.10/pole, and the top 10% pay more than £6.80.
(http://www.emilyware.co.uk/earthwork/images/stories/articles/allotmentrentleaguetable.jpg)
That's very interesting Unwashed - thanks for all the work you've put into it.
I guess amount charged is also affected by amenities offered like water/loos/security.....
We're on £7.50 per full plot and have been for 3 years.
Rent day was last night. Yay!! :D
It's a 'traditional sized allotment' I was told, and it's 100 years old, no change in boundaries as the previous owner cut terraces to mark the boundaries. Hazarding a guess, it's 23foot wide (ish) by 68 foot long (Does that sound right??)
There's NO water, or any other facilities. (Though we're putting in a compost toilet as we have 4 plots between our extended family.)
Camo
Quote from: camo_lady on April 13, 2011, 13:17:36
We're on £7.50 per full plot and have been for 3 years.
Rent day was last night. Yay!! :D
It's a 'traditional sized allotment' I was told, and it's 100 years old, no change in boundaries as the previous owner cut terraces to mark the boundaries. Hazarding a guess, it's 23foot wide (ish) by 68 foot long (Does that sound right??)
There's NO water, or any other facilities. (Though we're putting in a compost toilet as we have 4 plots between our extended family.)
Camo
so its 1.3 poles by 4.1 poles = 5.3 poles, a standard allotment is usually 17 poles (at least in Lincolnshire, Norfolk and Cambridgeshire), being the amount of land need to feed a family of 4 people, so round here that would a third of a plot.
5.3 poles at £7.50 = £1.41 a pole.
Quote from: lincsyokel2 on April 13, 2011, 16:14:28
so its 1.3 poles by 4.1 poles = 5.3 poles, a standard allotment is usually 17 poles (at least in Lincolnshire, Norfolk and Cambridgeshire), being the amount of land need to feed a family of 4 people, so round here that would a third of a plot.
5.3 poles at £7.50 = £1.41 a pole.
23' is 1.4 poles long (23/16.5==1.4) so 23' x 68' == 5.7 poles in area, so I'm going to call that £1.32.
Quote from: Alex133 on April 11, 2011, 06:58:20
I guess amount charged is also affected by amenities offered like water/loos/security.....
Self-managed sites appear to charge whatever it takes to break even plus a little in reserve for capital investment. in these cases you could probably put together something of a formula where the pole rate was approximately equal to combined costs of maintenance, administration, water, insurance, ground rent and capital levy all divided by the anticipated number of poles let. On any given site those various costs can vary quite a bit depending on circumstances, but the basic formula holds. The self-managed site is not run for profit so there is no incentive to maximise the rental revenue, and in any case the rent is often voted for by the members and that positively limits the rent to do no more than cover expenses. So for the self-managed site the rent has very little to do with the level of site facilities other than whether water is available or not, though rents on sites that are saving for a future capital investment will be expected to be higher. In the case of a well run site shop the rent may even be cheaper despite the added value of the facility because its profits can subsidise capital projects.
The situation on council-managed sites is different. The rent is essentially arbitrary and at the vagaries of political whim rather than based on any sound financial analysis. Invariably the councillors deciding the rent will have no idea what the going rate for an allotment is, and infrequently have no idea what it costs to run their own service or even how the money is spent. Some councils are happy to subsidise the service and charge little more than a peppercorn, whilst other, especially tax-capped primary councils, are under pressure to reduce the subsidy on a minority passtime. Some councils rate their sites in bands according to the facilities and this gives the impression of a systematic approach to setting the rent, but there is virtually no free market in allotments as you invariably take an allotment at your nearest site, so there is nothing to be gained by complicating the adminsitration which in all likelihood would see a nett saving if the allotments were let for free. So nationally you'd expect a degree of correlation between rents and facilities on council sites, but I suspect the effect is swamped by the essentially random level of subsidy.
And then of course there is a spectrum of devolved responsibility between these extremes, so the best a national survey of rents is likely to tell you is how rents vary, it can't tell you why.
Quote from: lincsyokel2 on April 13, 2011, 16:14:28
a standard allotment is usually 17 poles (at least in Lincolnshire, Norfolk and Cambridgeshire), being the amount of land need to feed a family of 4 people, so round here that would a third of a plot.
as secretary of the Norfolk branch of NSALG, I actually do get to know a little bit about allotments in Norfolk. the normal for Norfolk ( to coin a phrase) allotment is 10 rods. ;)
Quote from: tonybloke on April 13, 2011, 19:01:23
the normal for Norfolk
is that not an oxymoron? :o 8) ;D
Quote from: lincsyokel2 on April 13, 2011, 19:28:40
is that not an oxymoron? :o 8) ;D
No, they all live in Lincolnshire! ;) ;D ;D 8)