The Friends of Granton Castle Walled Garden will be laying out their plans to landowners later today. Developers plan to build housing on the waterfront site, but the Friends group argues that the historic garden should be brought back to it’s former glory for the use of the local community.
A Friends group delegation will set out their vision for the restoration of the garden as a focus for community renewal in a presentation to the EDI group’s management team this afternoon.
Granton Castle Walled Garden is currently owned by the EDI Group, an ‘arms-length’ development compnay wholly-owned by the city council, who previously submitted a planning application to build luxury houses on the garden site.
However The Friends group argue that the garden should be:
a garden for all to enjoy, with a range of learning growing and arts activities and a diverse events programme.
a restored market garden run by the local community, supplying organic produce directly to local people, businesses and schools, and
a living heritage garden, serving as a gateway to the waterfront development and a social hub for existing and future communities.
At the meeting, FoGCWG will stress that all local community groups share the aim of retaining the garden as open space.
The Friends prepared specific proposals for the development of the walled garden as a community asset after the EDI Group appointed architects to prepare a new masterplan for Granton Waterfront. FoGCWG are keen that their proposals for the garden should be incorporated in the new masterplan.
Specific features of the proposals include a visitor centre and cafe, a kitchen garden, a heritage orchard, a workshop and demonstration area, a sanctuary garden. a medicinal and pigment garden, a restored glasshouse and a polytunnel.
Friends chairperson Kirsty Sutherland said: “With these proposals, an important part of Granton’s heritage can become a catalyst for development and community renewal on Edinburgh’s Waterfront. They offer a wide range of benefits in terms of health and wellbeing, social cohesion, cross-cultural integration, community education and local capacity-building.
“The restoration of Granton Castle Walled Garden as a community asset is supported by a wide range of local stakeholders and national organisations.”
You can contact the Friends group by email at grantoncastlegardengroup@gmail.com
The group also has a website at https://grantoncastlewalledgarden.wordpress.com/
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