The odds on saving East Cowes’s much-loved Umbrella tree just got a lot shorter.
After fearing a £5,000+ bill to build a safety frame around the town’s Umbrella Tree, campaigners to save the tree now hope they have found a cheaper solution.
Chris Gutteridge, one of the Friends of the Umbrella Tree, and whose great-grandfather originally planted the tree during the reign of Queen Victoria, spoke to a structural engineer from Island Roads who cleared up the matter. He said:
“The engineer said the design he sent was only a suggestion and the £5,000 cost was only an estimate.
“This means we can go ahead and get our own structural engineer and, with a bit of luck, build on the existing frame, which is what we have been pushing for this whole time.”
Chris said he was over the moon when he heard the news as the group have started a fundraising campaign to raise the money, as no other public body will pay for the work.
A socially-distanced meeting was held with performances from local musicians and the debut performance of Steve Love’s Umbrella Tree Song.
More than £100 was raised to add to the online GoFundMe campaign, gofundme.com/f/umbrella-tree, which means £1,300 has been raised for the new frame.
The campaigners now hope they can move forward and find another structural engineer who can draw up plans.
Brilliant, Steve! Your’e a star!
And thanks for the good news regarding this essential part of Island history.
Keep it up, Chris, we’ll save it yet!
Why won’t the council donate some money towards keeping this tree upright and alive. Oh hang on, they only throw disgusting huge amounts of money away on the waste of space floating errrr bridge.
They would IF the person doing the work was paid millions and a very large ‘thank you’ padded card plopped on the ‘right’ cllr’s. door mats.
Vote these people OUT next given chance
Bamboo makes an incredibly strong natural scaffold ?
Great news, but get on with it now before they change their mind again!
Amazing!!! defeating the council and their mind numbing stupidity is worthy of an award . shows it can be done if enough people say ‘NO’ together, so come on Ventnor – keep the pressure on and stop them moving the bus stop from outside of Boots, yes it is a plan despite all the elderly and disabled people who find it so convenient.
We now need a campaign to save the only cash point (ATM) in Yarmouth.
It is under threat because (understandably) every one is encouraged to pay by card during the pandemic but there are times we still do need to get cash.