Hazelwood Residents' Association

Summing up the whole project 

Text of the speech delivered by Fran at the AGM October 2007, which was illustrated with the slides shown here 

Our entry epitomises the whole ethos of the RHS Neighbourhood Awards – so said the judges about our entry.

 To achieve this and to achieve our ‘Outstanding’ classification we had to put a lot of time and effort into achieving the requirements of the RHS who were looking for resident-led communities to take their first steps towards greening and cleaning up their local environment. 

The Neighbourhood Awards are non-competitive and each entry is presented with an award of improvement, a merit or outstanding achievement.  We are told that it is unusual for a first time entrant to receive an outstanding award.

Let me take you through the demands that the RHS placed on entrants:

¨  TOTAL COMMUNITY INVOLVEMENT

To this end we gave them details of our Residents’ Association which was formed in 1971, gave them details of our history and showed them pictures from the Summer Fête kindly taken by a member of our community, Len Sutton.  We also illustrated the many members of the community had been involved in this project, including young people  and people from India who recently arrived.

We told them about Tony Vellam who provided the wrought iron planters, the noticeboard and  the beautiful sculpture at the top of the road.  Tony’s sculpture proved to be the most difficult item to plant.

We told them about Michael Armstrong who had put in beautiful wooden planters which were wrapped around some more of our street signs. 

 We told them about the stone planters adorning the pavements bringing additional colour.

We told them about the involvement of the people who had helped us to dig and edge in the road.  We told them about people who had planted along the road. We told them about people helping us to pot on plug plants We did have one of the photographs published in the Evening Mail and someone likened us to Cleggy and Compo out of Last of the Summer Wine – I wasn’t too happy about that. We told them about George Gallagher mowing the verges before the judges came.

I also told the judges about people coming out and digging with us on the road.  Neighbours who live four or five doors away from each other had never met until they came out and helped us

Other people such as Brian Hope had his garden stripped out and a new wall and drive put in, along with beautiful planting and a lady with loosely draped clothes.  His house is called Silver Birches – jokingly I have renamed it Silver Boobies.  I didn’t realise our residents knew me so well.  He offered to bring out a bottle of wine when we were working in his vicinity.  I told him I didn’t drink until 6:30 pm and being an Army man he had the wine on the wall at 18:30 hours prompt

Dot Cooper, when we were working on Margaret Robbins’ shady garden, came along with her shopper – inside was a china teapot, cups, saucer, sugar bowl and cream – she knew my middle name was Mrs Bucket!

 The largest adversities were the two ends of the road.  First of all, a real eyesore was the corner of Shirley Road and Hazelwood Road.  Can we close our eyes and picture what it looked like – a crumbled away Victorian wall, the smashed in wooden fence.  However  we talked Bob Attenborough,  the owner, into building a new wall,  putting a proper fence in place and I cannot believe how good it looks.  I was worried as we talked to him first of all in February of this year and he did say he was doing something about it and I was really worried when April came and still nothing had happened.  But lo and behold, he called me one day in late April or  early May and said that he had started and that he was hopefully going to finish it before the judging.  I had great faith in him because I spoke to his bricklayer who mentioned that Bob had said most specifically that he wanted him to finish by a certain date prior to the ‘bloom’ judges attending.  The problem was that just before the judges came, an accident occurred on the other corner and the dentist’s wall was completely smashed in – one up, one down, as they say.

John, my neighbour  in  Dogge Lane Croft, braved the rain to paint Bob’s extensive fence.

The other end of the road was the black fence which houses the MEB sub-station.  Graffiti was constantly being put on this black fence.  I did quite enjoy removing it with black paint.  People came up and chatted – sometimes it was at night when I really wanted to watch Coronation Street but there is nothing better than having a good chat.  Since we have planted the Hydrangeas, however, we have had no graffiti and also I think we have softened the hard area by putting plants along the grounds of Clifton House and I really think with the plant pot and Tony Vellam’s metal planter on the other side and the planting by Steven Jackson, that this entrance to Hazelwood Road now looks fairly beautiful.

¨  THE REMOVAL OF LITTER AND GRAFFITI

We informed them that we have regular litter picks in our road and that we removed graffiti by overpainting red on the postbox, black on the boards at the top of the road housing the sub-station and, of course, the grey Cable TV boxes.

¨  FUND RAISING

We told them that as a community and residents’ association we hold fêtes every year and that we had raised some at the 2006 Summer Fête.

We also told them about the Community Chest Funds for which we had completed a form and sent it off and been awarded £4,500, all of which we haven’t spent yet.

¨  RECYCLING

They wanted to know about recycling.  We told them about the fact that lots of our members compost and also that we recycle aluminium cans by putting them in Steve Jackson’s container outside his house.  We put out our newspapers and magazines and our green waste for the Council on the right days.

¨  ALL YEAR ROUND INTEREST

They looked for permanent planting and plants which will give colour throughout the year.  We told them about daffodil planting in the spring.  The problem is it coincides with Mothers’ Day and we do have a few taken.  We also told them that we have Hellebores planted in the road, evergreen shrubs and plants and also other plants which are seasonal such as Sedum in the autumn, Aquilegia in May, Tulips in April and May and so on.

The Council would not allow us to put hanging baskets on the lampposts but we did put beautiful planting around the trees and some people even put stones round the trees.  If this is done they must be well in as they are prone to be lifted and thrown.

¨  BIODIVERSITY

They also looked for planting which encourages wildlife.  We told them that we had asked the Council not to put down weedkiller and because of this we feel that we have encouraged the wildlife such as hedgehogs and lots of birds and butterflies, a list of which was provided to me by Steve Jackson.  I didn’t know we had so many creatures visiting Hazelwood Road.  We also get a few creatures late at night who, unfortunately, have stolen some plants.  The last one of which is described as a large man in his thirties with a small dog – keep your eyes out for him.

It was really heartening to walk around and for people to show how proud they were of what they had achieved.  We went round Aspen Close and Sorrell Drive with Joy Evans and a member of Harden Housing and we had people like Janice, Alan and Edna talking to the judges about bird feeders and showing them their beautiful pots and borders.  We then proceeded along Hazelwood Road and the Major was happy to come out and tell them what he had done stripping out his garden and putting a new wall round. 

I also saw in Country Living magazine a bicycle with a basket planter put on the front.  So in one of the newsletters I asked for a bicycle and one was kindly donated by Rob who also designed our earlier website.  The judges asked me about it and I said I had asked any member of the community to provide me with a bike and because of this I wanted to use the bike that was provided.  They said I am sure you didn’t see a mountain bike in that article but still it served its purpose.

I put the bike outside Sylvia and Bill’s house – they were sitting inside the garden with Margaret Robbins and loved the garden and were most interested that Margaret had lived in her house since she was born (45 years!).

We also walked past John Trigwell’s house whose garden is always lavishly displayed with very colourful planting.  At this stage he had blue and red flowers and I commented that he must be a Villa fan and one of the judges asked ‘Is that where he lives?’

Becky and Kath Watson baked the most delicious cakes and provided tea and coffee.

It was all worthwhile, except that after working all day Saturday until about 8 o’clock one week I was told that I looked very dirty and needed a wash. 

However, it was most worthwhile – I don’t want to blow my own trumpet, but I was happy to receive the Chevrolet Award for Exceptional Community Achievement and went to the Lookers garage to accept it.  Patricia and Jeff accepted our Outstanding Neighbourhood Award.

One of the comments from the judges was that this was a first time entry in the neighbourhood awards and had all the hallmarks of efforts shown from the long standing entries into the main campaign.  In fact, one of the judges commented that the planting and the noticeboard would not have been out of place at Chelsea, would you believe.

My colleagues on the Committee are most worthy of some praise. Doug Wilson, who did lots of the heavy digging – that man really has some strength.  Greg Mason for his patience in edging and, of course lamp post painting – the judges really marvelled at this.  Patricia, whose idea it was initially to plant daffodils and helped on many projects, including painting the street sign metal support posts black to go with the planters.  Jeff  Robinson who helped with cutting back of shrubs, digging borders and finding many plants from his garden.  Dorrie Wilson who helped us keep tidy along the way.  Joy Evans who did lots of planting in the Sorrel Drive/Aspen Close area, helped planting round trees and in planters and, of course, watering.  Brian Prangle who developed our website.  People such as Len Sutton,  Ros Corser,  Louise Prangle, Tina, who helped dig and plant and Steve Jackson who has done lots of planting at the Fox hollies end of the road and all the people who have planted in front of their walls.

We have spread our wings to the War Memorial.  We thought something red flowering throughout the year to echo the poppies of Flanders Fields and have spent a weekend planting up and painting the benches – Lest We Forget.  I need some cement for the next job. 

My last words echo the judges that not only is Hazelwood Road surely the cleanest road in Acocks Green it also boasts public art, new hard landscaping, painted lamp posts and post-boxes but wonderful floral displays throughout.  I am most proud to have been the instigator of this campaign but I am very proud of what we achieved and very grateful to the Hazelwood Road community.