Help wanted to create Redbraes Community Garden

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An outdoor classroom, a haven for wildlife, and room to grow fruit and vegetables: this is the plan on the drawing board for Redbraes Community Garden. Now the organising committee just need some help to make it happen on the ground.

While Persevere Community Garden is taking shape, something equally inspiring is happening not far away. Among the houses of Redbraes there are plans to turn a hidden green space into a thriving community garden where people of all ages can come together to grow food and flowers on the banks of the Water of Leith

This is the vision of local community police officer Simon Daley backed by members of Redbraes Residents Association. Local residents, who have already built the Park Centre in Redbraes Park, met in October 2007 to pool ideas for a community garden that will offer an outdoor classroom for local school children, a haven for wildlife and allotments for fruit and vegetables.

Since then the community garden steering group has lost no time. Garden designer Rebecca Govier used residents’ ideas to draw up plans making the most of the sheltered site visited by herons, ducks and the occasional kingfisher. The City of Edinburgh Council has agreed to build garden paths and Simon Daley has applied to Breathing Places, the Lottery fund that encourages local people to create space for wildlife, nature and community involvement.

“It’s ambitious,â€? says Davie Thomson, chair of Redbraes Residents Association, “but if we all work together we can show how to create a wee bit of sanity in the every day hustle and bustle of city life.”

That’s why Davie, Simon and the rest of the steering group are inviting local volunteers of all ages to get involved. To find out more, they say you are welcome to pop into the Redbraes Park Centre where you can see the plans and details. Your opinions and help are welcome too!

Telephone 0131 467 3879 or e-mail redbraes@blueyonder.co.uk

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