Agenda item

The Superintendent of West Ham Park & City Gardens to be heard.

The Committee received a verbal update from the City Gardens Manager. The following points were made.

Finance - City Garden’s budget is in line with agreed budget profiles.

Staff - full complement of staff with a newly appointed Support Service Officer recently recruited.

Bedding

There is a two week delay for the summer bedding to be delivered to City Gardens. This is due to the late growing season due a cold winter and spring. The team have started to remove the winter schemes to ensure the summer bedding is planted as quickly as possible.

Projects

St Paul’s Walk, a new landscaping scheme, funded by Network Rail is now complete. This has replaced a previously overgrown shrub bed. The landscaping consists of multi stemmed silver birches and lawn areas, making good use of the restricted area for seating and views of the river.

London and Britain in Bloom – July and August

Judging is to take place in July and early August and as mentioned in previous updates this year’s theme is ‘Edibles’. To celebrate this theme, one of the volunteer City Gardens guides designed an ‘Edible Walk’ which took place on the weekend of 8/9 June as part of the Open Squares weekend.  She has reported that the walk was a great success; people were encouraged to eat Pansies Marigolds, Comfrey and Cornflowers as part of the experience.

Open Squares Weekend, 8 and 9 June

The City Gardens took part in the Open Squares this weekend, to draw attention to our gardens. The edible walk mentioned above was a new activity, as well as a treasure hunt designed and implemented by a group of corporate volunteers from the Discovery Channel. The hunt was felt to be imaginative, informative and fun, and can be a template event for future occasions.

Green Garden Lunchtimes, 17 – 21 June

A forthcoming range of free events taking place in Bunhill Fields advertised on the Corporation of London website and notice boards. Activities include Yoga, Pilates, a heritage tour, and an edible workshop, and a talk from the RSPB. All are delivered by either volunteers or businesses.

City Festival – Tree Theme

In partnership with the City festival organisers and Trees for Cities and sponsored by Bloomberg, the artist Konstantin Dimopoulos has been commissioned to colour seven trees in front of St Paul’s Cathedral entrance and ten trees in Smithfield Rotunda Garden. The project has been approved by the City Arts Initiative Panel and the Culture Heritage and Libraries Committee. Corporate volunteers and the Friends of City Gardens will be invited to assist the artist. The colouring will have no detrimental effect to the trees; the colouring is washable and will be removed at the end of the festival.

In addition, a first ever City tree walk and leaflet have been designed by Trees for Cities which will be launched during the festival period.

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Friends of City Gardens and volunteer activities

During May, thefriends have undertaken three clear up sessions of the roof garden of John Cass School, to enable the school and teachers to grow vegetables during the summer term.

The friends have just won their first grant of £494 from The Conservation Volunteers (TCV), to pay for tools and equipment and public liability insurance to enable them to run gardening and volunteer activities.

Growing Localities Apprenticeship Scheme

In partnership with the Royal Parks, West Ham Park and the regeneration charity, Roots for Shoots, the City Gardens team have been hosting two young people to gain skills, confidence and experience in preparation for them to apply for three apprenticeship positions to start in September.

A member of the Committee welcomed the Konstantin Dimopoulos initiative but expressed concern that it would encourage people to paint trees with inappropriate paints.