Ipswich Kitchen Garden

Steve and I have become regulars to the weekly get-togethers at the Leichhardt/One Mile Community Centre, where we helped get the Kitchen Garden (in it's present form) up and running.
  The garden was originally started by a few people but fizzled out. One person, Chris, stuck with it, putting in raised beds and growing veggies. He was quite successful - but it must have been hard work on his own! When Steve and I inquired about Transition Ipswich, I was very keen to start or be involved in a Community Garden. I was told by Cassie, a tireless Transition Town activist, that Chris would welcome help in the garden at Leichhardt. We got together for an initial meeting with a few other interested parties, and the fledgling Garden group was formed!
The garden in February 2011, the month after the 'big wet'!

 
   One of our members, Michael, was in the midst of his 'PDC' (Permaculture Design Course) by correspondence, and drew us up a wonderful plan for our garden. We presented it to the Community Centre for approval, and, apart from losing some for access and having to re-jig the plans a few times, we were ready to rock and roll with full approval. We began to sheet-mulch the grass with cardboard, and found a friendly local tree-lopper that was more than happy to drop us off a load of wood chips.

    Michael was doing a fantastic job directing our efforts to realize the plans, and liaising with the local council for possible donations and such, when we were hit with the bombshell...
  COUNCIL wouldn't allow us to develop the ground without an 'Impact Statement', costing $60000, or we maybe could get a discount, and it may cost $1000! It may as well have cost $1 million, we had no money either way! Every seed, plant, and energy to dig was volunteer.
     We were all a bit devastated. Would we have to just give up now, after all our had work? The garden was producing wonderful veggies and we were all quite attached...
  Michael came to the rescue by ferreting out a little-known caveat in the rules about land use from the council... A Kitchen Garden (maximum 25 square metres) was permitted without approval!
 YAY! So once again a re-jig of our plans, and then all hands on deck for the new Leichhardt Kitchen Garden, this time in the form of a Mandala...

 
  We removed the (icky) treated pine edging and scraped the edges in on the centre four boxes and then replanted the other vegies from the outlying boxes into the new mandala. Then we proceeded to build and plant it up each week.

   A donation of bricks allowed us to edge the paths, then later the whole garden, and our very clever gardener Chris built a lovely sculpture in the middle of our mandala to which we piped the water from the two tanks plumbed into the Youth Centre a few metres away.

 
With a sprinkler watering from on top it is quite spectacular!

 

   After completing the water tower, Chris got stuck into our next project (all his own design and idea), a herb spiral. This one is the monster version of the sweet little spirals loved of permaculturalists everywhere! 

Here's a pic of the start of it, with some peas growing for luck whilst it's being constructed!

   Below, a pic of the produce our lovely garden is providing...

  So all in all there is no place I'd rather be on a Friday afternoon!