The Rose Garden - Put the rosy glow back into the Rose Garden. Give young people and families a better experience of walking, gathering and playing in the town centre.

The Rose Garden was once a well looked aftert green space with a public toilet.  Today the roses are long gone, and the much-needed public toilet is closed and becoming derelict.  

The Rose Garden is located on Argyll Street and provides a pedestrian access route connecting a doctor’s surgery with Morrisons supermarket on John Street. Pathways from the garden lead over the historic Milton Burn to St. Muns Primary School, Clyde Cottage Nursery and the Glebe housing area. 

In the absence of other social places to go, young people often gather at the Rose Garden, sometimes seeking shelter in bushes or sitting on broken benches. 

In places the ground surrounding the Rose Garden is waterlogged, but it has an extensive grassed area that is underutilised for play or biodiversity. A gate at the back of the doctor’s surgery leads to Milton Burn, which is an historically significant water course for the town and a place teaming with wildlife but rarely accessed for recreation or learning. 

Local Place Plan 

• Work with young people, healthcare providers, St Muns Primary School and Clyde Cottage Nursery to re-design the Rose Garden for recreation and natural play aimed at families and young people. 

• Ensure that flood risk is managed by removing debris from the stream on a regular basis. 

• Improve signage and bin provision to provide access to recycling. 

• Work with stakeholders to identify how the public toilet can be improved, used or removed. 

• Prioritise this space as part of a strategy to increase footfall to the high street. 

Community Action Plan

• Argyll and Bute Council to work with community stakeholders to identify funding to support the co-creation of a Green and Blue space strategy and maintenance plan.  

• Argyll and Bute Council to work with community stakeholders to identify funding and utilise existing maintenance resources more effectively to support a spaces for wellbeing and biodiversity agenda more effectively at a local level.