SCAAweb - The Allotments

THE ALLOTMENTS

LOCATION: St. Columbs Park is located on the East Bank of the River Foyle in the Waterside area of the city of Londonderry. The main entrance to the park is on the Limavady Road with two other entrances on the St. Columbs Road. St. Columbs Park itself is the Waterside's largest park providing the local population with many leisure facilities, including a leisure centre, all weather pitch, athletics track, football fields, tennis courts, children's play parks, allotments, etc. All the park's facilities are managed by Derry City Council's Recreation and Leisure Department.
Allotment Gardens is located at the lower St. Columbs Road entrance to St. Columbs Park between the old St. Columbs Hospital site (now park land) and the athletics track / football pitch, itself only a few yards away from the banks of the River Foyle. From Allotment Gardens you can look across the river towards the city centre and see the historic Guidhall where the local council meet.

THE SITE: The allotment site consists of twenty two full size allotments. The site is eleven allotments long, with a two

foot wide path dividing each allotment, and two allotments wide with a single track roadway dividing the width of the site in half. Each full size allotment measures approximately 114 feet by 34 feet. Due to the demand for allotments many of the allotments on the site have been halved thus creating more smaller allotments each measuring approximately 57 feet by 34 feet. On the left is a site plan showing current full and half allotments.
Each allotment runs at a gentle slope along its full length. The upper allotments run downwards from the top boundary of the site towards the roadway and the lower allotments run down from the roadway to the lower boundary of the site. As well as the gentle slope from the top to the bottom boundary, the site also has a very slight slope from the start to the end of the roadway. As already mentioned the allotment site has a bitmac roadway (single vehicle width) that runs along the centre of its entire length. Each full size allotment garden is divided by a row of two foot square paving slabs that run from the roadway to the edge of the site. At the corner of each full size allotment garden next to the roadway is a thirteen square foot concrete apron, which can be used for erecting structures or parking. The site is secured by a high chain link fence which encircles the entire perimeter of the allotment site. Each allotment holder has a key to access the main gates at the top of the allotment site. The main gates open onto a tarmac area large enough for a council supplied skip (for allotment waste) and parking several vehicles. The allotment site has a mains water supply with four taps located along the roadway and tarmac area (see blue dots on the site plan).

HISTORY: There have been Allotment Gardens at the St. Columbs Park site for many many years. In fact the first allotments at this site can be traced as far back as the war years. Since then there have been many allotments at different times at or very near the present site. As well as the allotments based at St. Columbs Park over the years the city had other allotment sites, today however they have all disappeared just leaving the one site at St. Columbs Park.

In the late seventies the current site had been vacant for years and local council who owned the ground decided to develop what was then an empty space laying out 22 full allotments with a perimeter fence, road, paths and water taps.

The first ever licences for the present day Allotment Gardens at St.Columbs Park where issued by the local council in April 1980. Over the years as the demand grew for allotments the council decided it would start to half any full allotments that where handed back. This meant that new licence holders would only get a half allotment rather than a full allotment. Many allotment holders believe that a half allotment is big enough for them to deal with, so today there is a even mix of allotments full and half (see site plan above).