Colchester and its “cat’s litter tray” that cost £93,000! 😮

I am surprised that in these straitened times any council would consider spending over £90,000 on redesigning a roundabout. Turf and a Welcome to Colchester sign would be more appropriate. Spend the money on improving local services rather than giving it to an overpriced garden company.

The Albert is a big roundabout formerly just grass and a few shrubs. This is a Google capture just before the redevelopment.

Approximately 2800 plants from 60 different genera have been planted, and all have been chosen to suit the free draining, poor nutrient substrate, as well as year-round interest, low maintenance needs and benefit to wildlife.

www.bethchatto.co.uk/discover/our-blog/guides/planting-on-the-albert-roundabout.htm

We had a scruffy roundabout covered in weeds along our main road. The council did nothing so a group of guerrilla gardeners have planted it up and maintained it this year. They got lots of soil and plants donated and the local pub has kept it watered. It looks fab and cost hardly anything

"Dense, hairy vegetation"

The Cotoneaster franchetii is a dense, evergreen shrub with thick, glossy dark green leaves that are covered in tiny hair-like fibres. Compared with other plants commonly found in the UK, the orange cotoneaster, as it is sometimes called, is ”at least 20% more effective at soaking up pollution.”

MaizieD

I'm just wondering how resistant to pollution this planting will be. Unless there has been a radical redirection of traffic since I last visited, that's a very busy roundabout.

I went to a meeting about traffic pollution this morning and Colchester only has one short stretch of road that doesn't meet the national clean air standard. That stretch is nowhere near the Albert Roundabout.

Nannylovesshopping

As a Colchester resident, I can assure you the roundabout is hideous, and yes would have much preferred pot holes attended to. Have lived here many years, we are now a city, it would be rude of me to put in print how down the pan Colchester has fallen, the High street is a joke, no decent shops, as in many other high streets, M&S moved to retail park along with Next etc, getting a parking space is unheard of, if you do find one, can take up to an hour to get out, I could go on and on, but am boring myself, and need a large gin!

I live in Colchester and know that there are a lot of expensive White Elephant projects. I totally agree with NLS
Filling potholes is the remit of Essex County Council, who sit in their Chelmsford offices and have probably never set foot in Colchester.
If this roundabout doesn't need mowing or other upkeep it'll be less of an eyesore than many others.
If the OP got information from the Colchester Gazette then they should read some of the other guff that they make up on a daily basis.

www.rhs.org.uk/gardens/hyde-hall/garden-highlights/dry-garden

The garden is constructed of coarse-grained gabbro boulders and subsoil mounded over rubble. The topsoil was mixed with a high volume of sand and grit to provide the plants with a free-draining environment.

The thing about the Beth Chatto Gravel Garden is that the planting was designed to cope with future drought conditions

I remember a Monty Don article advising us all to plant Mediterranean plants, happy in drought conditions, as the UK would be enjoying Mediterranean-type summers in the future with global warming.

The following summer was one of the wettest on record.
Climate change will mean more rainfall.

There will be people all over the country still scooping the silt and mud from their now uninsurable homes.

Yes, it has been dreadful, homes flooded, rivers running down roads and even in the drier East, I'm surprised the sand has not been washed away.

The thing about the Beth Chatto Gravel Garden is that the planting was designed to cope with future drought conditions
It is not labour-saving - well it wouldn’t be with all those gardeners on-site would it?
We are all trying to think outside the box and plan and plant for dry summers, but what about wet autumns?
There will be people all over the country still scooping the silt and mud from their now uninsurable homes.
My friend in a neighbouring village still has the dehumidifiers running and restoration/refurbishment on her cottage isn’t due to start until January.
This roundabout looks sad and ugly but so do the overgrown roundabouts near me which enjoyed “No mow May” even less in June and became a positive hazard in July because of the height of the grasses which obscured visibility.
My point is there is no “on size fits all” and even less substitute for good gardening, planting and maintenance.

Yes, they started off with good intentions here, but our Council mowed at the wrong time and last year it all looked a bit sad.

Allira

MaizieD

^Re the roundabout: You need only ask why the weeds are growing happily in an area designed to deter weeds.
Any gardner knows that weeds don't mind topsoil, sand, gravel or even paving flags. Maybe they didn’t realise when they poured on all that sand.^

NOTHING deters a weed 😁

A weed is just a plant in the wrong place.

Wonderful for wildlife too.

I would hope that the Albert roundabout planting is considerable better than just wild flowers. Wild flowers are very labour intensive in that the area needs to be cleared of dead vegetation which would enrich the soil every year and, left to their own devices, the more invasive, strongly growing species take over after a year or two.

I do have confidence that the Beth Chatto team will do a really good, durable design.

The council will still have to keep on top of those weeds, though. Seeds come drifting in from all over.

Tee trend is towards wetter weather and more storms in the UK.

Thank you Whitewavemark2 for posting much more information about the project than the newspapers that want to knock the project chose to print.

Many years ago, I was one of the team who planted the Dry Garden at RHS Hyde Hall, under the management of the then curator Matthew Wilson and inspired by the work of Beth Chatto.

Many of the beds and borders at Hyde Hall are high maintenance. One of the main points of the Dry Garden was that it would be left to its own devices other than the occasional tidy. It wouldn’t be watered. Planting was very sparse with space for plants to spread and self seed. For the first few years it really didn’t look that great but look at it now.

www.rhs.org.uk/gardens/hyde-hall/garden-highlights/dry-garden

MaizieD

^Re the roundabout: You need only ask why the weeds are growing happily in an area designed to deter weeds.
Any gardner knows that weeds don't mind topsoil, sand, gravel or even paving flags. Maybe they didn’t realise when they poured on all that sand.^

NOTHING deters a weed 😁

A weed is just a plant in the wrong place.

Wonderful for wildlife too.

I'm just wondering how resistant to pollution this planting will be. Unless there has been a radical redirection of traffic since I last visited, that's a very busy roundabout.

its topsoil was replaced to prevent weeds growing
Our council spent a lot of money planting weed wild flower seeds!

I wonder what these drought-tolerant plants will be? They can't be getting as much rain over that side of the country as we in the West have been getting.

Putting membrane down and planting through it might have been a better idea.

Ilovecheese

I don't know why newspapers like the Telegraph have such a down on local councils, especially any that show initiative or any interest in the arts. Would they like Central Government to have control over all of us, all the time? is that in their interest?
Or is it that writing articles designed to make people angry is in their interest?
It is a mystery to me.

I suppose we all have different ideas about where money for ‘improvements’ could be thrown. If I were a resident, sod the aesthetics - just fix the bluddy potholes. And spend any over on cleaning the grids out so that leaves don’t gather causing ‘lakes’ at the kerb edges. Or clean off the graffiti. Or sweep away more litter. You know - basic maintenance that reflects a sense of pride in a city? No good having a beautiful floral and shrub roundabout in the midst of unattractive neglect, in my opinion.

Any residents of Colchester out there?
What are YOUR thoughts on this project? Are you delighted, or disappointed?

^Re the roundabout: You need only ask why the weeds are growing happily in an area designed to deter weeds.
Any gardner knows that weeds don't mind topsoil, sand, gravel or even paving flags. Maybe they didn’t realise when they poured on all that sand.^

NOTHING deters a weed 😁

Mollygo

Nannylovesshopping

As a Colchester resident, I can assure you the roundabout is hideous, and yes would have much preferred pot holes attended to. Have lived here many years, we are now a city, it would be rude of me to put in print how down the pan Colchester has fallen, the High street is a joke, no decent shops, as in many other high streets, M&S moved to retail park along with Next etc, getting a parking space is unheard of, if you do find one, can take up to an hour to get out, I could go on and on, but am boring myself, and need a large gin!

Re the roundabout: You need only ask why the weeds are growing happily in an area designed to deter weeds.
Any gardner knows that weeds don't mind topsoil, sand, gravel or even paving flags. Maybe they didn’t realise when they poured on all that sand.

Oh dear, - Chatto was and is still famous for dry gardens - so her plants of choice will be those that require drainage to survive. The sand will provide that.

I am assuming, although I don’t know, that this will be planted up in the spring. Skimming off the weeds will take no time at all.

Yes, eventually it will not only look lovely, it will be very low maintenance too. I pass this roundabout every couple of days. We do have a bus station, albeit very small. It is always the same here, whatever initiative is introduced, especially if it is anything vaguely "artistic" or heaven forfend "alternative", all the moaners get the press coverage.

So eventually it will look lovely

Nannylovesshopping

As a Colchester resident, I can assure you the roundabout is hideous, and yes would have much preferred pot holes attended to. Have lived here many years, we are now a city, it would be rude of me to put in print how down the pan Colchester has fallen, the High street is a joke, no decent shops, as in many other high streets, M&S moved to retail park along with Next etc, getting a parking space is unheard of, if you do find one, can take up to an hour to get out, I could go on and on, but am boring myself, and need a large gin!

Re the roundabout: You need only ask why the weeds are growing happily in an area designed to deter weeds.
Any gardner knows that weeds don't mind topsoil, sand, gravel or even paving flags. Maybe they didn’t realise when they poured on all that sand.

Nannylovesshopping

As a Colchester resident, I can assure you the roundabout is hideous, and yes would have much preferred pot holes attended to. Have lived here many years, we are now a city, it would be rude of me to put in print how down the pan Colchester has fallen, the High street is a joke, no decent shops, as in many other high streets, M&S moved to retail park along with Next etc, getting a parking space is unheard of, if you do find one, can take up to an hour to get out, I could go on and on, but am boring myself, and need a large gin!

I was born and brought up in Colchester. While I still had relatives living there I visited regularly, up until Covid. It's decline has been horrible to watch. It's only redeeming feature is the superb Castle Park...

I just asked google snd it came back along with a map. So it could be incorrect I guess?

Whitewavemark2

MaizieD

Oh dear.

Firstsite, where the 'Meanwhile Garden' will be, used to be Colchester's Bus Station. Much missed by the residents because Colchester now doesn't have one!

Still, a garden will be a nice addition.

Colchester still has a bus station.

It must be very new, then. The Colchester facebook page I'm on has been moaning about its lack of bus station for years.

Mind you, the facebook algorithm hasn't been sending it my way for quite a while..