Carleton’s Graduate Students’ Association (GSA) said problems are continuing to sprout up at its recently relocated community garden.
GSA vice president (operations) Justine Mallah said there are accessibility issues with the garden pathway proposed by the university.
“The proposal only allows wheelchair access to the raised beds designed for wheelchairs. Anyone in a wheelchair cannot access the rest of the garden,” she said.
Mallah said the GSA’s original site had provided full wheelchair accessibility to the entire garden. She said the GSA expects the same standards at the new garden as well.
The Kitigànensag community garden was moved from its original location by the university in October 2013 because of plans to build a new residence on the site. Last June, the garden was relocated behind the Nesbitt Biology Building following negotiations between Carleton and the GSA.
Funding for the existing pathway proposal was recently approved, according to Darryl Boyce, Carleton’s assistant vice-president (facilities management and planning).
He said construction on the pathway, which is the final stage of the relocation, would soon be going ahead.
“We’re going to try to get it done before winter so it’s ready for the spring,” he said.
Mallah said the GSA wrote to senior management on Sept. 19 requesting it reconsider the garden’s limited wheelchair access. She said so far the GSA has not received a response from the university.
Mallah said the GSA has had problems dealing with the university throughout the relocation process.
She said when the garden’s shed was relocated it was incorrectly installed and positioned in the wrong direction for wheelchair access.
As well, Mallah said pressure-treated wood was added to the raised beds, which was a “huge problem because an organic garden cannot contain chemically treated wood.”
She said the reassembled raised beds also had pointed ends of screws protruding through the cedar siding and into and above the soil.
“Anyone putting their hands in the dirt risked cutting themselves on the ends of buried screws,” Mallah said.
She said even after these initial problems were fixed, the GSA had to wait five weeks just to get a follow-up meeting with senior management.
But Boyce said the university has had its own issues dealing with the GSA. He said throughout the relocation process, the GSA kept finding “little problems with everything such that they couldn’t plant.”
“There were so many iterations in the planning stages and at some point we said, ‘well, if you want to have it for the planting season then we’ve got to move the planting beds now,’” he said.
Boyce said the university did everything in their power to have the relocated garden ready for last spring.
“It’s pretty frustrating on our part because we pulled a lot of stops out to get them there so they could be ready for the spring,” Boyce said.
“The shed is over there, the planting boxes are over there, there’s a flat area that’s been put on that’s above the normal water area and there’s huge weeds growing out of it,” he said. “It’s been there since the spring and they’ve done no planting.”
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