Author Archives: wallments

Plot Inspections – What are the Criteria?

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As you will already know, the WATA Plot Inspection Team carry out plot inspections on behalf of Woodley Town Council (WTC) on a regular basis. The next plot inspections will be carried out in early September.

You might not know that over 100 plots failed the last plot inspections for various reasons from not having plots numbers to low cultivation figures, rubbish on the plot, right up to completely unkept/worked plots. There are currently 61 people on the waiting list ready to take on a plot!

Below you will find the back section of the recently updated 2025 Welcome Pack that focuses solely on Plot Inspections and what the criteria the plot inspection team are looking at during a plot inspection.

This document contains an expanded description of the Tenancy Agreement that we all have signed in January 2025 and like any other agreement that you sign, there is a level of expectation that you are agreeing to its requirements for renting an allotment on this site.

We know that there may be various reasons that some tenants are unable to comply with the tenancy agreement requirements through ill-health, changing personal circumstances such as finding a large plot too much to work. We also understand that not all tenants have enough time to visit their plot every day. Those that we know about are given some leeway during the inspection process, those that we don’t know about, probably fail the inspection.

As mentioned above 100 plots failed the last plot inspection in June! There are 61 people on the waiting list, there are only currently 5 vacant plots available. WATA is working with WTC to improve the inspection criteria and shorten the process of review of plots that fail inspection.

The Committee believes that all plot holders really do want to see a better looking and more productive (cultivated) Allotment site. We hope that by issuing this document, it will help all tenants better understand what they signed up to in the 2025 Tenancy Agreement.

If you have any comments, feedback or questions then let us know by replying to this email.

Many thanks &
Kind regards

Mike McNamara
Chair – WATA Committee

Click on the image to download a copy of the Plot Inspections – What are the Criteria?

WATA Committee Meeting Bullet Points – 12th June 2025

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Please find below Bullet Points from our last Committee meeting. Simply click on the image below if you would like a PDF to download and read offline.

If you have any questions/comments, then please let us know by leaving a comment at the bottom of this post – ‘Leave a Reply‘- or by emailing readingroadplots@woodley-allotments.org.uk and we will get back to you with a response.

Finally, we continue to build up our revised Mailing List, if you have not already joined it, you can opt-in here.

Launchpad Presentation Slides

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In case you were not able to attend our WATA General Meeting at the Oakwood Centre last evening, we have attached a PDF copy of the presentation that Launchpad’s Kirsti Wilson gave about their activities in and around the Reading area. It was good to hear just how much valuable work they do in this area. You can download a copy of the Slide Presentation by clicking on the image at the end of this post.

If you would like to come along and help with our onsite Launchpad plots that produce food for the Readifood scheme, and help with weeding/watering or even providing extra assistance on corporate days, then just reply to this email and we will arrange to meet up with you.

We also discussed a few Allotment Association items, including the Co-opting (under para 3h of the Constitution) onto the Committee of Wendy Wilkinson as the Committee Secretary and Geoff Wilson as the new Committee Treasurer (taking over from Mike McNamara who has been carrying out this role temporally). There was also a discussion about Plot Inspections, which we will talk about in another, more detailed email in the coming days.

Lastly, yes there will be another meeting as we are looking to hold these on a regular basis. The next one will be in early August (date to be announced), we have not yet picked a final topic/speaker, some suggestions could be Honey Bee/Asian Hornet threat, No-Dig to name two. Let us know if you have a topic you would like to see covered.

Kind Regards
WATA Committee

General Meeting – 23rd June 2025

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As we have mentioned previously, we want to start having regular meetings on various topics with guest speakers, the first one is going to be held on Monday 23rd June.

Further meetings will cover subjects such as Bee Keeping, the advance of Yellow-Legged Asian Hornet across the UK & No-Dig to name a few. Let us know if you can think of a subject that we should cover.

So that we can get an idea of numbers, please let us know if you are attending by replying to this post. You can download a PDF copy of the agenda by clicking in the image below. See you there.

Coffee Ground in the Garden/Allotment

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We currently have access to a regular free supply of used Coffee Grounds available for delivery, small bags only.

If you are interested in having some, please drop an email to readingroadplots@woodley-allotments.org.uk with your name and plot number and next time we have some, we’ll drop a couple of bags off at your plot.

Click on the image below to find out more about using Coffee Grounds with your plants.

We have just published our revised 2025 Welcome Pack

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This contains a lot of handy hints and tips for those taking on an allotment for the first time. There is also a section at the back that deals with Plot Inspections – What are the Criteria? which expands on what is in the Tenancy Agreement that we all signed at the beginning of 2025 and will hopefully explain what is behind the Plot Inspection thinking.

Please click on the image below to obtain your own PDF copy of the 2025 Welcome Pack.

Many thanks
The WATA Committee