Today, St Helens Borough Council is raising a new Green Flag at Victoria Park – its seventh consecutive award.
The award is granted annually and is the international quality mark for parks and green spaces.
After 18 months that have seen our parks and green spaces play a vital role for people through lockdowns as a place to relax, exercise and meet friends and family safely, the news that Victoria Park has achieved the Green Flag Award for the seventh consecutive year is testament to the hard work and dedication of the team that make the green space a great space that everyone can enjoy.
High quality, accessible parks and open spaces will be the focus of an upcoming long-term council strategy, with a commitment to protecting them now and in the future.
In addition to the work of the council’s Grounds Maintenance and Ranger teams, the park owes its high standards to the support of the Friends of Victoria Park – a volunteer group dedicated to the park’s maintenance and improvement.
Green Flag Award Scheme Manager Paul Todd said: “I would like to congratulate everyone involved in making Victoria Park worthy of another Green Flag Award.
“To meet the requirements demanded by the scheme is testament to the hard work of the staff and volunteers who do so much to ensure that the park has high standards of horticulture, safety and environmental management and is a place that supports people to live healthy lives.”
Councillor Andy Bowden, St Helens Borough Council’s Cabinet Member for Transport and Environment, said:
“The importance of our green spaces has never been clearer than in the last 18 months, granting us time in nature and away from urban life, and places in which to relax and exercise to improve our wellbeing.
“While today it is Victoria Park that is celebrating, this achievement is as much for all our parks across the borough, receiving the same level of care and attention for residents to enjoy.”
The council’s grounds maintenance team has an extensive maintenance schedule of the borough’s 22 urban parks, 10 country parks, 6 natural green spaces and nature reserves, 37 amenity green spaces and the two borough cemeteries.
Victoria Park joins parks and green spaces as diverse as the National Memorial Arboretum in Staffordshire, Woodhouse Park in Peterlee and Chiswick Old Cemetery in London.
The Green Flag Award scheme, managed by environmental charity Keep Britain Tidy under licence from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, recognises and rewards well-managed parks and green spaces, setting the benchmark standard for the management of green spaces across the United Kingdom and around the world.