Gardening on a city vacant lot--possible problems?

I'm starting a new garden on a vacant lot so close to my house that I can hook up an extra hose in my back yard to water the new space. It will be mixed vegetables, fruit and ornamentals. The lot is owned by a nearby neighbor so I want to be especially careful not to create any "attractive nuisances" or other issues that could cause her any problems.

I also would be concerned about the potential for vandalism. This will be my third garden on a vacant city lot in my lifetime and I did suffer two MAJOR(!) acts of vandalism in the past.

I think there is less potential for vandalism here, but it is not unthinkable, as I know from experience: I maintain a small welcome garden on public property at the entrance to our street, and several years in a row someone drove their car right through it! Where that garden is, it was no accident that a car went careening through it.

Now this vacant lot is across the street from a factory which closed down early this year. It is on a somewhat busy street, but not a wide one, nor even one with traffic lights. The lot is on the corner of the street and an alley, so it has blatant exposure on two sides with no fence. I cannot afford a fence and would not invest in it anyway as the owner of the lot hopes to sell when possible (My saving grace is that she is asking too much money.)

I want to present a friendly face with the garden and want people to feel like they can stop and talk when they see me there, yet I don't want people to feel free to saunter about when I'm not there. I certainly don't want them to feel like they can just take anything they see there, be it plants, tools, flowers, whatever. I cannot quite see the lot from my house, and neither can any other neighbors from theirs. Despite being in a rather public place, there is no one who is likely to see anything going on in the garden unless they are walking or riding by.

Oh, I should mention that there is a street light near the garden, so if someone does walk in the lot at night, I think they should be able to see where they are going.

Do you all have any advice for me? What should I watch out for? What should I absolutely not do?

 

I am bummed. Saturday I worked until 10:20 pm to get a lot of work done, knowing that weather in the mid to upper 90's with high humidity was predicted for this week. I worked so hard.

I finished planting two beds with salvia, chrysanthemums, portulacca, daisies, and marigolds, plus did a lot of new digging, watering, and general odds & ends.

Sunday morning I went out to make sure the newly planted bed was sufficiently moist. Already I saw vandalism. Someone drove their car through one flower bed.

I don't want to be a baby, but I instantly felt like I wanted to cry. :'( Every year a car used to be driven through the flower bed I maintain on the public parkway, so this repeat performance just struck me hard. I don't know if it is maliciousness or just some sort of self-centeredness where someone is so lazy to take the normal turns on the streets, but instead make a beeline for their destination regardless of whether they are even driving on the street or the parkway or a garden.

 

I think you're very brave for trying to beautify a vacant lot like that. Unfortunately some people seem to derive pleasure from destroying what other people have worked hard to make, and since I'm not their mother I don't quite know what to do about it.

In our small town with 40,000 people the park department plant lots and lots of blooms and bulbs every year, and every year there's some vandalism to it, despite the police patrols and people in the streets.

I'm so sorry you had such a bad start, and can only hope that it won't happen again.

 

Many things are coming together well for this vacant lot gardening. But...I went out to water that new bed at 4pm (did not check it all through the day), and guess what?

Yes, the flower bed was driven through a second time. I found some big chunks of brick and mortar from the chimney of the wood-frame house that used to sit on the lot. I propped them up to try and make just a little blockade.

On the parking lot across the alley I found the end of a burned 8 X 8 timber. I propped it upright with some bricks I had dug up, plus half a brick I found on the parking lot. I also had 3/4 of a concrete block in my yard so I brought that over. Hopefully this will help.

I'm turning over ideas like putting up a cardboard sign that blocks the way and says, "Please don't drive through these flower beds. It breaks the plants and it breaks my heart." Well, then there are the more vengeful thoughts like accidentally leaving a bunch of hard rakes scattered about, tines up and sharpened to a tire piercing point. I thought about staying up all night seated in an inconspicuous spot to get a license plate number should they do it again. In my city, though, I think the police would never get around to responding to something like this...and rightfully so compared to the scary and important work they have.

Now I'm wishing I had the concrete blocks I gave away on Freecycle this year. I could use them to make a little fence with some pieces of wood left from my pergola project.

Really, I'm not sure the errant driver even knows there is a flower bed there. The flowers mostly aren't blooming yet, nor are they very tall. But I do think the beds stand out from the mown grass all around. Maybe they don't know there are flowers there, but they sure must be inattentive at best. I hope this is not going to be an ongoing saga.

Oh, I waited too long to water. The daisies look pretty rough. That one is my fault.

Well, thanks for being my listening ear. I think many people have no idea how important a garden can be to the gardener. It's just dirt, you know

 

I'm liking the idea of stones put up as a barrier. Most people are very afraid of damaging their cars, so there won't have to be a tight blockade of them either. It's just to make people think that they oughtn't drive there. Good luck with it.

 

Droopy, I think you were right. So far it is working, thank goodness. I have been so happy working on this new garden and felt emotionally punched in the stomach by someone who would plow through it like that.