The Colne Valley Regional Park held its annual forum at Uxbridge Golf Course on Thursday 15th May. It was really interesting to spend a day with our partners, explaining about our work and concerns and hearing their views on how we can work collectively to protect, promote and enhance our precious regional park.
The day was opened by Hugh Stokes, Chair of the Colne Valley Park Trust who welcomed the ninety attendees and outlined the format for the day. It started with three presentations, then questions, next everyone was split into groups by area for landscape recovery workshops. After lunch and networking we were joined by Danny Beales MP, who rounded off the forum with a talk followed by more questions.
It was a privilege to chair the Colne Valley Park forum, and to be part of a day that illustrated how important the Park is to different groups of people who care about it and contribute to its objectives. The presentations and discussions were of a high standard and provided much to think about in relation to the pressing issues facing the Park.
Presentations
Stewart Pomeroy, Colne Valley Regional Park Managing Agent, was first to present, he gave an Update on Green Spaces, Rivers, Funding, Countryside in Crisis Campaign.
The update on the Countryside in Crisis Campaign included highlighting actions that local authorities and national government need to implement to ensure the CVRP has a future. His talk explained how local activists had saved Hampstead Heath from developers in the 19th century, and ended with the suggestion that we might become the Hampstead Heath of the 21st century.
The next presentation was from Richard Barnes, Head of Planning and External Affairs at London Wildlife Trust (LWT) whose subject was Nature Recovery. LWT manage Frays Farm Meadows a nature reserve close to today’s venue, Denham Lock Wood, Uxbridge Grove and Frays Island & Maybeys Meadow in the CVRP. Richard spoke about “rewilding” opportunities, local plans, the National Planning Policy Framework, The London Plan and London’s Green Belt.
Michelle Jones, the Colne Valley Regional Park’s Landscape Recovery Manager, gave the third presentation, explaining the work she and colleague Bergey Sigurdardottir have been doing across the park, including details of a four-year project in Denham Woods part-financed by HS2 mitigation and through our own match funding efforts.
Michelle encouraged everyone to visit Staines Moor, where she has been working on access improvement from Stanwell, this work includes funding from the Ramblers Association.
Other work has included a footpath project for Three rivers.
Bergey had organised a couple of litter picks with volunteers and partners. One such was in Denham: we are delighted not much litter has been attracted since January.
Questions
The questions that followed were on
the Heathrow Southern Rail Link, Responsibility for diseased ash trees beside the Colne Valley Trail in Harefield, access via public transport to green spaces in the Regional Park; a proposal for a Local Nature Recovery Strategy to cover the whole regional park, Hillingdon council reporting of species, purposeful destruction of land by developers, public access/right to roam, farming clusters, definition of grey belt, off airport parking at Heathrow, antisocial behaviour in green spaces, sustainable transport.
See here for the detailed Questions and Answers.
Breakout Workshops
Attendees were allocated to tables by area and given an exercise to suggest places in the regional park where they could see problems, asked for ideas on how these might be addressed and partners to work with to achieve this. We were pleased to see loads of discussions on each table and thank everyone who shared project ideas with us. If you would like to send us more ideas, please download the workshop form here and send it to us via email on [email protected]
Danny Beales MP Talk & Questions that followed
Danny Beales MP for Uxbridge and South Ruislip, joined us for the day. He talked about nature, areas of challenge and how we can work together.
He described the Colne Valley Regional Park as a hidden gem, that we need to shout about, celebrate and encourage people to discover.
The elephant in the room is the future of the Green Belt. Yes, we need more housing, but this should not be at the expense of the natural environment. It is clear that we must protect the green belt and need a coordinated approach to invest in green space.
Heathrow expansion is back on the agenda. The government invited them to bring forward a plan. His position is that he is sceptical, expansion is incompatible with climate change. Local labour MPs agree that expansion must match the four key tests. Unless these are met, they will not support expansion. Heathrow expansion will have a significant impact on rivers and nature.
He values the work we do and knows the CVRP Trust is not well funded. He mentioned that the CVRP is in a very different position from the Lea Valley with their levy.
You can find a summary of his speech and the questions that followed it here.
One of the questions was from Stewart Pomeroy who had said in his presentation ‘let’s pool resources to create the best green corridor in Europe and referred to similar issues in the late C19th at Hampstead Heath. What can government do to help us meet that aspiration?’
Danny’s answer was: ‘Clearly we are all concerned about the future of the green belt. There’s been piecemeal development of existing CVRP. The status quo isn’t helpful. A strategic plan is needed with local authorities working together on the detail, to map the area showing sites to conserve and which are opportunities to develop. He would be happy to bring the parties together to facilitate the making of that plan.’
And finally
We’d like to thank Danny and London Wildlife Trust for their words and everyone who attended and for their input. Thanks to the Board of Trustees for agreeing to cover the costs for hosting this event. We hope everyone was inspired, if you have any follow up questions, please get in touch at [email protected].
Michelle Jones presenting.
You can view the detailed presentations here:
Stewart Pomeroy, Colne Valley Regional Park Managing Agent : Update on Green Spaces, Rivers, Funding, Countryside in Crisis Campaign.
Richard Barnes, Head of Planning and External Affairs at London Wildlife Trust (LWT) : Nature Recovery.
Michelle Jones, Colne Valley Regional Park, Landscape Recovery Manager : Landscape Recovery in the Colne Valley.
An interpretation board at the Old Orchard in Harefield which charts the history of CVRP.
Danny Beales MP talk
