LIVERPOOL'S "secret garden" is finally to disappear to make way for a new £6.2m housing development.
Hidden from public view, Greenhill Nursery, in Garston, was, for many years, the lodging house for the city’s rare and world famous botanical and orchid collection which was turfed out of Calderstones Park at the height of Militant rule in the mid 1980s.
Until then the park’s Harthill Gardens, a huge complex of greenhouses, deserved its reputation as the Kew Gardens of the north. It was open to the public and cared for by a dedicated team of gardeners.
During the industrial and political battles of the 1980s, council parks and gardens workers were called out on strike. Fearing the precious collection of rare flora would suffer, the so-called Harthill Six stayed in work.
When the strike was over, the decision was taken by councillors to close and bulldoze the lot. Some say it was because they were in a poor state of repair, others were convinced it was an act of political revenge.
Former Lord Mayor Eddie Clein in his recent book, Falling Off the Fence, was scathing about the demise of the Harthill greenhouses at Calderstones.
“Following a refusal to take industrial action by an extremely militant union led by Ian Lowes, in retaliation (Derek) Hatton sacked the (Harthill) gardeners and in a spiteful act of venom and vandalism, sent the bulldozers in to destroy the greenhouses containing all the plants,' he wrote.
"The message was clear: Stand in my way and out you go.”
The collection disappeared from public view for decades. It was removed to Greenhill, a closed nursery, where shrubs and plants intended for city parks were grown and nurtured.
The Greenhill nurseries housed a world famous boatnical collection for 23 years
An application coming before the council’s planning committee next Tuesday will, if approved, see the site flattened and transformed into a small estate of 83 houses.
The scheme by Morris Homes, is being recommended for the go-ahead by planning officers, though a number of local residents have lodged objections, mainly because of fears over safety with a proposed access route to the new estate from Greenhill Road.
Hidden from view by the main West Coast railway line and council houses along Long Lane, Garston, the plan will see a development of detached, semi-detached and mews houses.
The committee is also being recommended to approve a seven storey building at 16 Seel Street in the city centre to 52 student units with commercial use on the ground floor, and over behind London Road a six-storey accommodation block of 121 student rooms in Oakes Street.
