Allotments 4 All

Interesting article from the Guardian website about allotment closures :

http://www.guardian.co.uk/lifeandstyle/2013/may/31/turf-war-escalates-britains-allotments

Thanks for this Number Six. I read it on line and then also found it in the paper today. I am particularly interested in this as Farm Terrace mentioned is in my neck of the woods.

It may be worth people looking at the conditions of the original acquisition of the land.    I believe that Swindon have seen off a couple of attempts to sell off allotment land.     

Previously our site had a 100 year lease but we are now on a 10 year lease when it was renewed.  This took 2 years to negotiate and we started 3 years before the last one expired

Quote from: Digeroo on June 02, 2013, 06:17:37
It may be worth people looking at the conditions of the original acquisition of the land.    I believe that Swindon have seen off a couple of attempts to sell off allotment land.   

Yeah, my site was closed (before I arrived in Swindon) only to be re-opened when it was pointed out to them that the terms under which the land had been given to the Council in someone's will meant that if they used it for anything else it reverted to the estate of the deceased.... so they reopened the site.... it has its issues, endemic white rot caused by some garlicy weed keeping it going for one, and wind-tunnel class breezes, but the soil is no worse than most Swindon sites adn at least I was able to get 10 poles
A lot of council's are stuck with budgets they can't make work adn the only thing of value that has cost them very little to acquire is allotment sites with outline planning permission foisted on them.....
chrisc