Vandals have struck

Posted byCPGA CommitteePosted inaccess, BBQ, facilities, gates, tablesTags:

It’s with great sadness that we have to report that vandals have struck at our gardens in the past week. They appear to have entered the gardens by climbing over the gate at Crown Road South (causing damage in the process) and from there vandalised our picnic tables and BBQ area.

Investigations have been underway on options to repair and replace.

Damaged BBQ

We have lost two of the four slate beds as a result. We are exploring tradesmen availability and will be updating you all again soon when we have a confirmed fix scheduled.

2 slate beds smashed and on the ground

Damaged Tables

Our picnic tables are in a particularly poor state of repair. These are very old benches now and nothing lasts forever. Many of them had already been skipped by The Rock, and reclaimed for our gardens over ten years ago, so they have actually lasted well under the circumstances.

Things haven’t been helped by the pandemic lockdowns and lack of access to tradesmen and garden supplies, and so the tables did not benefit from their annual protective treatments during that time.

Vandalism just sealed the deal. We had hoped to reboot the annual repair and re-treatment of the tables in June and had even called for volunteers to help. That will now be cancelled.

wood splintered and gouged

We are now looking at wood recycling options to help them on their way as something hopefully new and useful.

New tables

So it’s time to replace. New tables have now been ordered and we hope to have these in the gardens in June, date to be confirmed.

new 6-seater tables with easy access and sociable layout
new children’s tables with lower table and seat heights and inbuilt storage

More accessibile

This does however provide an opportunity to choose models more suitable for our gardens. The new tables have the same capacity of 6 people, but offer “walk in” access, more suitable for any residents with mobility issues than the current “step over” access.

design allows easier “walk in” access from the sides of the seats, instead of the usual “step over” access of our current A-frame tables

More sociable

Another benefit of the new models is their circular arrangement of seating around a round table top, and so more sociable than the current models.

round table tops and a circular layout of seats around it create a more sociable space

More inclusive

There are many residents with young families and this also presents an opportunity to provide tables specially designed for children, with lower table and seat heights.

More storage

We also received an offer last year from one of our residents to help us set up some fun and educational activities for children, encouraging an appreciation from an early age of the wonderful nature all around us. We are working through those ideas and should have something more to share soon.

When these do come along we will need a place to store some laminates and simple gadgets like bug viewers, etc. So we’re delighted to find that the children’s garden table model is also designed with a novel removable table top to store things underneath.

table tops can be removed to access the storage space underneath

Delivery date

We will let you know when we have a firm date from the supplier for delivery.

UPDATE: we have now had a confirmation from the supplier that the new tables will be delivered and assembled on Tuesday, 28 June.

Published by CPGA Committee

The CPGA Committee are elected at every AGM to manage the upkeep and development of Crown Pleasure Gardens, in a beautiful corner of Glasgow’s West End. One of the main pillars of their work is to ensure good communication and consultation with the association of residents they serve, ensuring residents priorities are at the centre of committee business. As part of this the CPGA website was launched in Spring 2022 and will continue to be updated and promoted to residents as a focal point for updates and information.

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