What the Broadmarsh area of central Nottingham could look like if the Wildlife Trust’s post-Covid wildscape plan gets the go-ahead.
Although headlines tend to feature the thoughts of leaders with limited imagination, that doesn’t stop other people from thinking. Stories like today’s make me happy, whether or not the ideas ever are fully implemented, because it’s reassuring to know there are always people working on creative solutions to problems.
Phoebe Weston writes about a UK mall at the Guardian, “An empty 1970s shopping centre in Nottingham could be transformed into wetlands, pocket woodlands and a wildflower meadow as part of a post-pandemic urban rewilding project.
“The debate about Broadmarsh shopping centre, considered an eyesore by many, has rumbled on for years. This year it was undergoing a [$116 million] revamp by real estate investment trust Intu when the firm went into [bankruptcy]. …
“As retail giants such as Debenhams and Arcadia Group falter, Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust has come up with a new model of inner city regeneration: urban rewilding.
“The trust wants to bulldoze the already half-demolished Broadmarsh building and turn it into [6 acres] of scruffy green space at an estimated cost of [about $5 million]. The designs were created with Influence Landscape Architects and could set a precedent for what to do with the growing amount of vacant retail space in other cities. …
“Ponds surrounded by reeds, crocus meadows and wet grasslands would attract butterflies, dragonflies and a range of birds including reed warblers and black redstarts, according to the Wildlife Trust, which is calling on people to back its green vision. It will put its plans to Nottingham city council in the coming weeks as the authority canvasses views on what Broadmarsh could become as part of a 10-week consultation process.
“The proposed scheme would run counter to the conventional idea of urban parks and instead hark back to what Broadmarsh would have looked like in centuries gone by.
“ ‘Often open spaces in cities can be manicured and a bit formal,’ said [Sara Boland, managing director of Influence].
‘The idea of this was to have more rewilding, restoring, protecting [so] the zones we then developed were about foraging, pond dipping and protecting species.’
“Nineteenth-century maps helped architects get a clear picture of what this part of Nottinghamshire once looked like – a fertile garden area covered in fruit trees. Old street names include Pear Street and Peach Street; those fruits would be grown in the park to reflect its heritage. Crisscrossing the park would be walkways based on centuries-old street layouts.
“Nottingham Wildlife Trust has long wanted to create green corridors in this area of the city to connect it to Sherwood Forest to the north. It has put up nest boxes on many buildings close to Broadmarsh to encourage black redstarts, which used to live in the city but are now rarely seen. …
” ‘Over the past 20 or 30 years … we’ve submitted ideas for roof gardens and new avenues, all sorts of greener features,’ said Erin McDaid, head of communications and marketing at Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust. ‘We feel this could be a real opportunity for the city to stand out from the crowd as cities across the UK look to recover their economies and find a new direction for urban centres.’ …
“ ‘Anyone coming into Nottingham on the train would have to pass by [Broadmarsh] before they reached the city centre, and it was just this horrible, ugly building with no windows. It was very unwelcoming,’ [Nottingham resident Ewan Cameron] said. …
“David Mellen, Nottingham city council leader, said the conversation about the Broadmarsh site had captured people’s imagination. He said: ‘It’s a once-in-a-generation opportunity to reimagine a significant space right in the heart of one of the country’s core cities.’ ”
More at the Guardian, here.
Suzanne's Mom's Blog 
Grateful for Earle’s comment, sent by email as WordPress is is doing weird things to him. Will investigate. Earle wrote: “During my career I spent several years as manager of the California Department of Water Resources ‘Urban Stream Restoration Program’. After we had partnered with local governments and citizens groups in granting funds to restore green corridors and paths along urban streams, we hired a UC Davis Economics Professor to look at the economic impact on the community of the projects we had funded, compared to those which had applied for but not received a grant. They published their results. You can look up their paper by their names, John Loomis and Carol Streinor. (I hope I spelled her name right.) The impact of the creek parkways was a significant increase in the market price of homes within a quarter mile of a restored stream parkways. In California, property tax revenue is based on the sales price of a home. The result was tens of thousands of dollars increase in the market price of homes near parkways, and the increase in property tax revenue (and in some cases reduced flood damage) far exceeded the maintenance costs, and the citizens who had partnered in the planning and even planting along the creek were insistent that the local government maintained the corridor. Nottingham may find an economic windfall from their plan.”
What a great idea! I hope it comes to fruition, especially as the building is half-demolished anyway. A very hopeful piece to read on this cold day. .
The more we get the word out about how both governments and individuals can benefit economically, the better chance we have.
I managed an Urban Stream Restoration program in California, and we wanted to know how a citizen-based partnership with the local government to make a creek into a parkway and footpath would benefit the neighborhood. We hired an Econ professor and his grad student to give us a study on the impacts. Here’s an abstract of their report:
Author – Streiner, Carol
Author – Loomis, John
Project year – 1995/01/01
– The hedonic price method was used to estimate residents’ willingness to pay for improvements in urban streams. This study examined California’s Department of Water Resources Urban Stream Restoration Program to determine the economic value of stream restoration measures such as reducing flood damage and improving fish habitat. Seven projects from three counties: Contra Costa, Santa Cruz, and Solano, were pooled for analysis. Property prices in areas with restored streams were found to increase by $4,500 to $19,000 due to stabilizing streambanks and acquiring land for education trails. This represents from 3% to 13% of the mean property price in the study. Recommendations for facilitating further analysis are made and implications for quantifying the benefits of similar programs in other states are provided.
Title – Estimating the Benefits of Urban Stream Restoration Using the Hedonic Price Method
VL – 5
JO – Rivers
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