Your Community Greenspace
The National Lottery Heritage Funded, £1,965 million, five year, Your Community Greenspace project is now in the delivery phase and will complete later in 2026.
The project includes improvements to the infrastructure in the Park, alongside new events and community projects, that will respond to the growth of the city and region.
The project has three key themes:
- Empower and engage our communities to help conserve the natural heritage of Nene Park.
- Build bridges with the multi-cultural communities of Peterborough to make Ferry Meadows an inclusive community hub.
- Improve physical and mental health and wellbeing through nurturing connections with nature and the outdoors.
Why these three themes?
Peterborough is the UK’s fastest growing city by population, fostering a diverse and rapidly expanding breadth of communities; its vibrant multiculturalism exemplified by over 142 languages spoken in local primary schools. The City has significant health and wellbeing issues, e.g obesity and hospital admissions for mental health issues amongst young people are both significantly higher than the national average.
Nene Park Trust has a strong track record of providing a much-loved Park for our community; but we want to take steps to ensure our spaces are as inclusive as possible for all of Peterborough’s residents. We also have a part to play in addressing citywide challenges whilst also enhancing our own heritage and nature capital through community involvement. Our ultimate goal is to ensure the Park continues to enrich the lives of Peterborough’s people, present and future.
Different elements of the project:
Through this project, we have improved and replaced key structures and buildings in Ferry Meadows, hosted community events and facilitated communities to host their own events; developed a community plant nursery to deliver green social prescribing sessions; funded education sessions for schools who wouldn’t ordinarily be able to access the Park; develop new volunteer roles; encourage health and wellbeing.
Find out more about the different improvements to Park infrastructure below.
New Willow Bridge
The new bridge, named Willow Bridge, after a public vote, opened in October 2023, replacing the old Pontoon Bridge that sat in the same location in Ferry Meadows for 35 years. Designed by C B Arts, sculptural metalworkers in Cumbria, this new bridge is made from Corten weathering steel to be both robust and resilient. The railings evolve into beautiful gateways of tree sculptures at either end of the bridge, blending well into its natural Park setting and creating a new stunning landmark for the Park.
Welcome Area Improvements
The welcome area when you first arrive at Ferry Meadows has had a number of improvements added, including upgraded toilets with the addition of a Changing Places facility, a new canopy for shelter and shade over the parking machines, a central feature tree and seating, new planting and improved visitor signage. This work was completed between 2023-2024.
Expanding Lynch Lake Community Hub
We have made this existing building a more flexible community space for workshops, teaching and performance. The addition of a large decking area and flexible weather-proof canopy in 2025 has made this a very useful indoor/outdoor space that different community groups can use. Click here for details about hiring the Hub.
Creating Nene Nursery
In 2023, this micro plant nursery was created from scratch on the edge of Ferry Meadows by a team of Nene Park Trust staff and volunteers. It now is a fully-equipped nursery complete with potting shed, polytunnel, accessible raised bed, composting area, plenty of seating and even a composting toilet.
The nursery is an accessible place of security and calm where users are surrounded by plants, flowers, smells and sounds to promote learning and relaxation.
As well as the funding from The National Lottery Heritage Fund, the nursery also received grants for construction and tools from The Augean Community Fund through the Landfill Communities Fund.
We now offer regular green social prescribing sessions at the nursery as well as public drop in events where visitors can learn more about plants, gardening and take part in mindful crafts and activities.
Additional Nene Nursery funders
Hosting Community Events
As one of our project aims is to ‘Build bridges with the multi-cultural communities of Peterborough and make Ferry Meadows an inclusive community hub’ we have facilitated a number of community events throughout the project. These include:
- Durga Puja – the Hindu celebration of the Goddess Durga
- Ukrainian Family Picnic
- Polish Community Music Concert
- Sikh Community Tree Planting
Improving Health and Wellbeing
In 2024 we launched Try Running, a volunteer-led running group for beginners which has gone from strength to strength, running weekly sessions. 2026 will see the launch of the Try-cycling following a similar pattern of volunteer recruitment, training and regular free sessions for the public.
We have also supported the local Chinese community bring Tai Chi sessions to the Park, a local non-profit Karate group run karate sessions for disadvantaged families and free yoga in the Park during the summer months.
Our Schools in Residence
Each year of the project we have hosted a primary school from an area of Peterborough and welcomed groups of children to the Park for six education sessions throughout the year run by our Nene Park Trust Education team.
Our Schools in Residence have been:
- Paston Ridings School
- Orton Wistow, Nene Valley and Woodston Primary Schools from the Meridian Trust
- Gunthorpe Primary School
- Ravensthorpe Primary School
Sustainable Transport
As there is no regular bus route that comes into Ferry Meadows, we worked with local bus company Central Connect in the summers of 2024 and 2025 to run a special weekend bus service from locations around the city right into the heart of Ferry Meadows.
New volunteer roles
Through Your Community Greenspace, we have developed a number of new volunteer roles to help create a welcoming, inclusive Park and to encourage more people to join our volunteer programme:
- Welcome Rangers
- Young Rangers
- Wellbeing Wander Leaders
- Nene Nursery Volunteers
- Try Running / Try Cycling Volunteers
Our work with the LGBTQIA+ community
In 2023 we funded the development of ‘Identities’, an exhibition on Queer history of Peterborough, which was launched in Ferry Meadows and then transferred to Peterborough Museum.
We have also developed and held specific activities in consultation with this community such as The Big Gay Swim and Archery for LGBTQIA+
Our Digi-Park
This project element is all about bringing the Park to everyone, whether they can physically make it into the Park or not, with our seasonal wildlife videos, virtual tours and online resources.
Take a look at our Winter Wildlife Walk video below – and see more of our digi-park resources here.
