What the Broadmarsh area of central Nottingham could look like if the Wildlife Trust’s ambitious post-Covid wildscape plan gets the go-ahead. Photograph: The Wildlife Trusts

When we’ve written about rewilding on this site before we usually are referring to bringing  wildlife back into a landscape that had lost it for decades, if not centuries.  This Nottingham project has precedent in terms of plans to transform an urban eyesore into public space that is welcoming to both biodiversity of fauna and flora, and the people who will benefit from taking pleasure in it.

Thanks to the Guardian for highlighting the story. We look forward to reading about the finished project!

An additional Public Service Announcement: If you like this story the Nottingham Wildlife Trust has an ongoing petition to help make this project a reality. Please feel free to follow the link and add your name. Being local to Nottingham is not required.

Going wild? A radical green plan for Nottingham’s unloved shopping centre

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 £86m revamp by real estate investment trust Intu when the firm went into administration.

The number of empty shops on UK high streets has risen to its highest level in six years, and 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 2.5 hectares (6 acres) of scruffy green space at an estimated cost of £3-4m. 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. “It’s unbelievable to hear that stores like Debenhams are in the position they are in – they’re stalwarts of the city, but it does put out an opportunity,” said Sara Boland, managing director of Influence.

The Broadmarsh post-Covid rewilding scheme would fit in with Nottingham’s ambition to become the UK’s first carbon-neutral city. Photograph: The Wildlife Trusts

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 Boland. “The idea of this was to have more rewilding, restoring, protecting – this kind of connectivity, 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.

“We’ve actually spent quite a bit of time over the past 20 or 30 years looking at various redevelopment proposals for this part of the city and for the Broadmarsh centre. 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.”

 

Read the entire article here.