With the apparent desperate shortage of allotments in London in autumn of 2013 I was pleased to read that Sustainable Merton had received £77,000 of funding from Local Food (a project supported by the Big Lottery Fund) to bring an abandoned area at the Tamworth Farm allotment site back into cultivation. This chunk of land was head high in brambles and had been for the last 15-20 years or so!
They brought it all into use in late spring and summer of 2013. Of course, I was hugely busy at work and totally forgot. By the time I remembered, in September 2013, I thought I’d missed my chance. So I was overjoyed when I found out they still had plots, so happy that I took a day off work and scampered down to their offices with my application form and first year’s rent clutched in my hand. I walked out with a key to the Rose Avenue site and my very own plot on the site.
This is what it looked like back in September 2013.
The pic on the left is face on from the front path, the one on the right is from the top left hand corner of the plot. The black compost bin marks the boundary, the galvanised water tank is in the next plot over (they are shared one every other plot).
As you can see the weed covering wasn’t too heavy, though there was a line of low brambles on the far left hand side, which marks the boundary with the main access path.
My plot is roughly 7m x 5m (21 x 15 ft) which is a good started plot. There’ll be a map below eventually showing size and layout and I’ll upload some retorespective posts to show progress. Summer 2014 was OK, summer 2015 a wipeout (new job, much less time for gardening). I’ve done some better ground prep and am hoping for a much better 2016 season!
Since I got my plot in 2013 I’ve been sucked into joining the TFAS committee and am now the social sec leading on planning events for this year.
South London Living 