New Community Garden!

Join us to discuss your vision of community gardening and what could grow here. We will meet on July 20th at 7 p.m. in the Slate Room at HSCA, 1320 5th Avenue N.W. Interested? Read on below, or e-mail Jim Stirling at jimstirling@shaw.ca for more information.

Proposed site of community garden:

On Tuesday 25th May a small group of nascent volunteers met to plan the “Big Dig” for a second community garden in Hillhurst- Sunnyside. For a while now there has been a long waiting list for access to the existing garden. Momentum has been building since HSCA Executive Director, James Michi, indicated support for a garden located on HSCA grounds, owned by the City. The proposed site would be to the west of the day-care playground, south of the soccer field and parallel to 5th Avenue. Early indications are that it’s a great site with rich soil, good light and access to irrigation. The HSCA location itself is easily accessible by public transit, has parking, bike stalls and already supports a wide range of programs including the Farmers’ Market.

The garden would be a community partnership between the HSCA, resident-volunteers and the City of Calgary. We have technical support from SAIT for mapping the garden site. And we also have the written support of Alderman Druh Farrell. The ground is ready and the seed has been sown. Now we need the nurturing dedication of a group of at least 10 gardeners (the G10?) to plan, survey, write, lobby and grow. But we need at least that number of volunteers in order to make a go of it, and we are not there yet! Plan to attend the meeting on July 20 to help!