A community group which planted flowers and grew vegetables on derelict land earmarked for building is being taken to court by Glasgow City Council.
North Kelvin Meadow Campaign said its volunteers had acted after the former playing fields in Clouston Street had lain unused for more than 25 years.
The council said a development planned for the area would provide new homes, a park and playing facilities. It is seeking to evict the group and has been granted an interim interdict.
North Kelvin Meadow Campaign was formed in October last year by local residents who wanted to “clean up” the land on Clouston Street.
Douglas Peacock, who chairs the group, said the idea was to transform a derelict piece of land into community use. “The campaign began with a few people volunteering to plant flowers and clean up the site,” he said.
“It’s now a wild flower meadow and on the back of this some local people wanted to grow vegetables – hence the raised beds which we have installed. We now want to do something bigger and install a raised bed which will grow herbs and lettuce for the whole community."
The campaign group’s case is being backed Green MSP for Glasgow, Patrick Harvie. “The city council has seriously misjudged popular feeling about the North Kelvin Meadow, and it will regret this absurd legal action,” he said. “Local people are being taken to court for improving their public space, for working together and for growing their own fruit and veg, something which Glasgow needs to do much more of.
“The North Kelvin Meadow Campaign is Glasgow at its finest, and the council should be listening to it, not prosecuting it.”
Read more on this story at the BBC News website.
