Residents Put ideas on Paper for Community Garden at Twin Ponds

More than 40 people gathered at on Thursday night to offer their visions of what a mostly-city funded community garden at will look like. 

People discussed their ideas and wrote them and drew them on large pieces of clear paper overlayed on large photo maps of the site.

Suggestions included:

•Creating compost areas

•Designated parking places for gardeners,

•berms

•play areas,

•a shed that looks like a house,

•creating a dog policy

•no tobacco policy

•building a central covered picnic area

•a sink

•a drinking fountain

•a covered gazebo

•bird houses

•planting a bed of native plants

•setting aside a place for vertical edibles such as grapes.

Not all the ideas will be used but some of them will help shape what emerges over the next few months. The next design meeting will be held Feb. 21 from 7 to 8:30 p.m. in City Hall Room 301. The Parks Board will evaluate the proposal at its Feb. 23 meeting.

"We had a really nice turnout," said Parks Board Chairman Bill Clements, who lives in Richmond Beach. "The variety of ideas were great. It showed the passion they had for the project and the expertise in the community."

The garden will be situated on the south side of the park where old basketball courts used to be. The first phase of the site, which is expected to be completed by April, will be about 1/4 acre with an expansion to 1/2 an acre when the next phase is funded. The first phase is funded with $34,000 from the city as part of the City Council directed Healthy City Strategy. 

Individual plots for Shoreline resident only, will be available by March 22 at a cost of $30 per year of a 10-foot- by 10-foot plot or $60 per year for a 10-foot by 20-foot plot. The plots will be 12-inch raised beds.

A 4-foot by 10-foot "enabled" plot, which will be raised to the height of 27 inches to make it easier for those in wheelchairs, will also be available.

Gardening is expected to begin on April 14 following a kick off celebration.

The watering system for the plots will be tied into the city's water system and is included in the plot fee. 

"I'm extremely impressed by the amount of information and ideas we have here," Parks Project Coordinator Maureen Colaizzi said. 

One Parkwood resident complained about the lack of input in the process from the neighborhood.

This is Parks Director Dick Deal's response:

"I met on a Saturday in October with  representatives from the Parkwood Neighborhood Association, Diggin Shoreline, Vineyard Church, and interested citizens regarding the possibility of removing the old basketball court that had been unused for fifteen years and creating the Community Garden.  The Parkwood Neighborhood Association is a neighborhood group without much energy or enthusiasm.  A new person stepped forward at the October meeting to re-energize the neighborhood (Donimica) and is very supportive.  The Community Garden has been discussed at City Council meetings and Park Board meetings several times in the past six months and was published in the January CURRENTS.

"Nora Smith, City neighborhood coordinator, hoped to use the Community Garden process as a means of getting the Parkwood Neighborhood Association energized again.  There have been two postcard mailings to all neighbors within 1,000 feet of the Community Garden asking for their input and inviting them to attend the meeting last night.  We have received a fair amount of feedback from neighbors, all positive with the one exception mentioned.

"The Community Garden will generate very little noise and no large traffic issues.  People tend to come and go from community gardens and we will not have enough plots to be a traffic problem.  It is a change in the use of the site. With the old basketball court and the hoops removed there has been no activity since 1995.  So this will be an increase in activity in this area, but not a negative one.  The Director and several residents of Aegis have expressed great interest in the Community Garden and we will be constructing handicapped accessible plots for elderly and disabled citizens.  I think many Aegis residents will love just sitting and watching the garden grow."