When the Town of Athabasca built the riverfront parking lot, it anticipated a fountain being added.
However, no such fountain has been installed, and Birch Meadow Greenhouses owner Lois Robocon asked the town last year if she could plant vegetables in the empty space instead.
The garden is located in the northeast end of the parking lot within the circular roadway at the end of 48th Street. People can weed or pick vegetables out of it any time.
Robocon said she pitched the idea to past Town of Athabasca chief administrative officer Doug Topinka. She also ran it by town Mayor Roger Morrill, who thought it was a great idea.
Last year Robocon didn’t advertise the free vegetables because she was unsure how they would grow.
However, she said the garden did better than expected.
“We had a late spring frost last year, and we had some really nice vegetables left over,” she said. “We really didn’t know how it was going to work, or grow, but we thought we would try it even though it was late in the season.”
This spring, the town still hadn’t installed a fountain, so Robocon asked to continue the garden as she had had many positive reviews.
“The idea was for the people in town who have no place to grow a garden, and people at some of the complexes: they have gardened all their lives, and they would love to go and pick some veggies and pull some weeds,” she explained. “If anyone wants to just help us out and pull a few weeds, that would be great.”
This year, corn was planted. There are also cucumbers, parsley and dill.
Robocon said in case anyone is wondering, the bare spots in the garden are where watermelon was planted. She explained last year a bunch of her staff planted watermelon plants at their houses, and they grew very well.
“We thought we would plant a bunch of it in the circle,” she said. “We have had so many cold nights this summer, the watermelons aren’t doing too well.”
She added they tried to fill in some sections with flowers.
“We tried to fill it in with flowers so it was not only functional, but had some aesthetic properties to it as well.”
