Call for action on Pendle's 'tatty' gardens (From Burnley and Pendle Citizen)

Call for action on Pendle's 'tatty' gardens

11:30am Monday 25th June 2012 in Pendle

EFFORTS should be made to rejuvenate ‘tatty’ front gardens outside terrace homes in Pendle, according to a senior councillor.

Regeneration work in Nelson, Colne and Brierfield is set to benefit from a £1.33million cash injection from the Homes and Community Agency, to overhaul ‘clusters’ of empty homes.

Around £750,000 is set to be spent on providing loans of up to £7,500 to refurbish properties in Railway Terrace in Brierfield, Colne’s Waterside district and Bradley and Southfield in Nelson.

This would leave £600,000 for ‘public realm’ projects, to tidy up residential streets across the four areas.

Coun Tony Greaves, cabinet member for planning policy, said: “Lots of these areas are what estate agents would call flush-fronted properties, which means they open out on to the street.

“But in Waterside they have got ‘pocket’ front gardens. I was wondering whether some of this money could be spent on them. Some of them are just tatty. If there is still a garden then it is covered in weeds or litter, or it is just concreted over.

“This is only my view from Waterside but it seems that tackling these pocket gardens should be a priority.”

Council leader Coun Joe Cooney added: “It is something we can take back to the people behind this and look at.”

Loans will be over a maximum five-year period, with up to a three-year period interest-free and whatever is borrowed must be matched by the would-be developer, councillors were told.