“I’ve got the key“

(for those unfamiliar, the title references that classic 90s pop song by the Urban Cookie Collective)

It was a frankly shocking spring evening on Thursday. But respect to our six association residents who braved the rain to come pick up their new garden gate keys.

By now we should all have our keys for the new Hyndland Street gate. Look out for those little red envelopes!

As this is a full-scale issue of a new way to access our shared property, we would ask that everyone acknowledge receipt of this key.

There are 3 equally easy ways to do that, so take your pick…

  • drop us a line at hello@crown.garden
  • pop over to https://crown.garden/key and fill in the quick form
  • jot your reply onto the paper slip that came with your new key, and re-use the red envelope to pop through the letterbox at 82 Highburgh Road

For ease just quote your unique “H-number” printed on both your envelope and on the paper reply form, so we know which household safely has procession of their new key.

And please confirm your name and (if you are happy to have updates that way) preferred email address so that we can keep our contact list up-to-date.

Many thanks.

(Aside: we are now aware that, for some among us who never used it, this may be news that the old Hyndland Street gate has been problematic for many years now. After repeated efforts to fix by the committee during that time, the sad conclusion was that it was actually beyond repair and needed replaced. With the peak garden season upon us once again it was therefore replaced as a priority to ensure easy access for all).

Please Take Care of Our BBQ Area

As I’m sure we can all agree, looking after our gardens is everyone’s responsibility. Sadly not every resident is currently taking that good sense approach.

Damage & costly repair

This has now caused damage to our BBQ area that had to be repaired, a cost that could have been avoided with some simple care.

burning hot coals added to BBQ area directly and abandoned

This damage was caused by a resident adding their coals to the BBQ slate area directly. The intense heat has cracked the slate in multiple places.

cracked slate after burning hot coals on top

This same resident also did not clear up the burned out mess after them.

Easy solution

This cannot be repeated. The BBQ area was not designed to take hot coals directly. It is simply a safe place to sit disposable BBQ kits, the type with tinfoil trays full of coals and a grill to hold food.

examples of disposable BBQ grill kits that can be used on our BBQ area

Clean-up

Four of these disposable BBQ kits were also left abandoned by residents. Again, please clear up after yourself once you have enjoyed a lovely summer BBQ.

A committee member has cleaned all of this up for you. But to be clear, this is not the role of any committee member. They are simply volunteers elected to help manage the upkeep of the gardens. It is up to all residents themselves to clean up and take away everything they brought into the garden on each trip.

If we all clear up after ourselves in this way, we each do our bit to keep our garden beautiful and functional for the next resident looking forward to sharing a BBQ with family and friends on a lovely warm day.

Thanks for understanding.

Pick-Up Your New Gate Key

Good news! Our broken Hyndland Street gate has been replaced and the concrete is now setting.

You can pick-up your copy of the new Hyndland Street key in the garden on

Thu 12 May

between 6:30 and 7:30 pm

(unclaimed keys will be hand-delivered this weekend)

In the event that the weather is not kind on the night, all keys will be hand-delivered over the weekend.

Hyndland Street Gate Closed Mon 9 to Wed 11 May

So that’s the gate now closed off until Thu 12 May.

From then we hope to have a new fully functional gate, and everyone will have their new key to access our gardens that way.

Remember that the other two gates work fine for access to our gardens during these works.

We will update you later just to confirm all has gone to plan and the new gate is now ready for us all.

Hyndland Street Gate Works

A few days ago we posted an update on plans for repairs to the Hyndland Street entrance to our gardens.

As this has been problematic for some years now, we wanted to properly fix this before our peak garden season.

Good news! We have just heard today (at rather short notice admittedly) that this entrance will now have a new gate fitted on Monday 9 May.

It will be out of action for 2 to 3 days while the cement for the new gate posts sets and new keys are cut and delivered to residents of each household that has access to the gardens.

The other gates into the gardens (on Crown Road South and Foremount Terrace Lane) will remain functioning with your original key.

Please use the alternative gates marked in green
during the installation of the new Hyndland Street gate

Once installed, you will have 2 keys for our gardens:

  • the new one for Hyndland Street entrance only
  • the original one for the other entrances

The Committee is also considering some cost-effective options to return us to a single method of accessing all gates at some point in the future.