Making High Peak's parks fit for the future

Published on 14 March 2022

High Peak's parks and green spaces not only look beautiful, they are dedicated places to celebrate our heritage and culture, look after our health and wellbeing, to connect with nature and just enjoy being outdoors.

High Peak Borough Council is committed to protecting and enhancing these special places and the new Parks Strategy sets out the Council's vision to ensure our parks and green spaces are vibrant, attractive and actively maintained spaces for the whole community to enjoy for a wide range of benefits.

The Council will invest in both formal parks and informal green spaces and work with community and interest groups, to protect, enhance and manage these places.

This includes setting up the Parks Development Fund to ensure additional resources are allocated to park projects that help deliver priorities in the Strategy.

Councillor Damien Greenhalgh, Deputy Leader and Executive Councillor for Regeneration, Tourism and Leisure, said: "Investing in our parks and open spaces is a key priority for the Council - providing quality places where people can enjoy time outdoors has always been important but they have become a green haven and a lifeline for so many people during the pandemic.

"We are very fortunate in High Peak to have a good mix of both formal parks and informal open spaces as well as what we have newly defined as neighbourhood parks and local play areas. We're absolutely committed to ensuring all these valuable assets meet the needs and aspirations of our communities now and in the future.

"Partnership working is really key to this and we're encouraging cooperative working with community and interest groups so we can make our parks and green spaces even better.

"The parks development funding we're allocating to this is a statement of our intent - we're putting our money where our mouths are and backing our ambitions with the funds to deliver real improvements which will benefit all of us.

"We hope you'll see, and feel, the improvements we're making together to make High Peak an even better place to live!"

The Council has declared a climate emergency and set a target of being carbon neutral in its operations and the services it delivers by 2030.

Executive Councillor for Climate Change, Environment and Community Safety, Jeans Todd, said: "As well as being good for our physical and mental health, helping to regenerate natural environments is a major contributor to tackling climate change.

"The Parks Strategy framework gives focus to the work the Council and our partners are doing to ensure our green spaces play an active role in helping achieve our targets around carbon neutrality and nature recovery.

"Enhancing biodiversity is key and this will also influence the way we manage each location. We're already taking action on this and there's more to come."

You can read more at www.highpeak.gov.uk/Parks-Strategy