Sheffield’s parks to benefit from new five-year strategy

Sheffield City Council has set out its ambitions for the city’s parks with a new five-year strategy that could see millions invested to improve Sheffield’s green spaces.

With 74 public parks and nearly 1,000 other green spaces across the city, the new Building Better Parks strategy allows the council to consider applications for new facilities in a fair and consistent way, that not only maximises the potential benefits for park users, but protects the parks for generations to come.

The council’s overall approach to investment in parks for the period 2018 – 2023 focuses on seeking out and securing new income from areas such as new capital grants and new revenue streams. This is having already committed £1.2 million of public health funding to 2020 to improve parks, estimated that around £8 million could be available for investment in facilities across the whole city over the coming five years.

Mary Lea, cabinet member for Culture Parks and Leisure, said: “We’re very proud of our parks in Sheffield but we know some provide a better visitor experience than others and we want to improve this. I’m very pleased to approve the new five-year strategy which enables us to explore a wide range of possibilities and fulfil our parks’ true potential. We maintain and improve our parks to the best of our capabilities and there are many exciting opportunities we would love to pursue but there is only so much that can be done with our ever-reducing budget.

“Through Building Better Parks we can bring together all potential income streams including grant funding, volunteering and business partnerships, to provide new business opportunities, bring back unused land and assets and create real leisure destinations for the whole city, but even better still, we can generate sustainable income that will guarantee our parks can thrive. Our 13 Green Flag Awards are testament to the quality of our parks, and using some of our £1.2 million Public Health investment we’ve improved ten parks this year alone, including the major transformation at Norfolk Heritage Park. Now we have the chance to keep this momentum going for the next five years to make Sheffield’s parks some of the best in the country.”