Nature Neighbourhoods will realise the ambition established by the People’s Plan for Nature at a neighbourhood level. The overall project vision is to activate communities to take action for climate and nature in their local area. Through Nature Neighbourhoods communities will have increased confidence and capacity to identify changes they want to make and those they want others to take, to reduce pressure on nature and climate as well as mitigate the impact of climate change and restore nature at a local level.
81% of UK adults believe nature is under threat and that more needs to be done urgently to protect and restore it.
48% are willing to act themselves to reverse the damage, but 42% don’t feel empowered to do so. (YouGov poll of 8580 adults in September 2022).
We are currently failing. We need to breathe, eat and drink with nature… and live better in the future. To do this, we need nature to have a voice at the centre of decision-making…while nature needs to have a seat at the decision-making table, the interests and livelihoods of people also need to be protected. Only then will (our) People’s Plan for Nature be accepted by everyone.
Nature is valued and respected by all.
There is a balance between human and non-human needs, and we are taking individual and collective responsibility to enhance, sustain and enable nature to flourish.
Evidence-based nature renewal is central to lifelong education and involves real life experiences.
Based on local economic and nature deprivation data, the Tufnell Park area has been selected as Islington’s ‘Nature Neighbourhood’. As part of the project, we are developing three local nature anchors in the area; Hilldrop Community Centre, Octopus Community Plant Nursery and Whittington Park Community Centre.
Find out about and get involved in upcoming events at all three anchors here:
Development of the Nature Neighbourhoods project is within the context of:
Creation of Liveable Neighbourhoods in Islington
Islington's Biodiversity Action Plan
Islington Council's 2030 Net Zero Action Plan
Islington is the 3rd smallest, and most built up of all London boroughs covering 14.86km squared.
It is the most densely populated local authority in England and Wales with 15,517 people per square km.
249 hectares of land is defined as being deficient in access to nature.
57.3 hectares of land is on housing estates.
17% of Islington is deficient in access to nature.
In total there are 64 Sites of Importance for Nature Conservation (SINC) in Islington, many areas are parks, but also include cemeteries, churchyards, school grounds, and housing estates.
Community Conversations
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Walk and Talk
The Nature Neighbourhoods Project kick started in Islington with our Walk and Talk on the 21st February 2024. Starting off at Octopus’ Community Plant Nursery, the walk route took us through Tufnell Park, giving an opportunity to stop and observe spaces, discuss, share ideas and take photos along the way. Concluding with a workshop lunch at Whittington Park Community Centre, we had the opportunity to share photos and talk about why these spaces had stood out, thinking about great examples, and where changes could be made.
Thank you to all of those who joined us on the walk, on what was a very damp and windy Wednesday morning. We loved hearing the contributions from local people, organisations, and policy makers, and seeing such passion about Islington’s green spaces.
Watch a reel of photos, and listen to conversations here!
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Vision
Our first Community Conversation was all about vision, we were joined by Dr Mikey Tomkins, University of Brighton and Dave Bamford, Islington in Bloom, Islington Council. Dr Mikey spoke about the work he’s done with communities across the country to map urban food growing, more here. Dave shared the plans for Islington in Bloom 2024, as well as how to enter this year’s competition - see here.
Discussions focused on what we love about local nature, what we’d like to see in 2050 and where we’ve seen examples of people working together to restore local nature.
We all made pledges and wishes for what we’d like to see, and what we could commit to make change happen locally.
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Call to Action
The Call to Action Community Conversation took participants through a process that begun with thinking about the overarching problems we face, why these problems occur, and what actions we can put in place to play a part in solving these problems.
Groups came up with great action plans, that can start to be put in place immediately, showing that quick wins are possible even for the problems that seem overwhelming to begin with.
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Vision and Leadership
Our third conversation event looked back and the ideas and action plans from previous sessions to think about who needs to be involved to make change happen, how we might engage these groups/individuals to make changes, and what our one big asks might be.
We discussed making nature jobs more visible to young people, by getting people doing those jobs into schools and community settings, having everyday conversations to encourage people to pay attention to the nature around them, and much more - including some nature art!
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Regulation/Implementation
The fourth of our series of Community Conversations explored some of the ideas that had emerged from previous discussions, to think about how these could be implemented, and what regulation is in place around these ideas.
We were joined by Sally Oldfield, Parks Partnership Manager for Islington Council, who talked through some of the processes the Council have in place around planting tree pits, making changes to parks and much more.
We had lots of great discussion, thinking about the need to record the history of spaces as they change, share local knowledge, and the importance of communication.
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Food Systems
This conversation looked at two core themes, and we discussed what is already happening within those themes, what action needs to be taken, and how we might do this, as well as what our key asks would be to local businesses to support a more sustainable local food system.
We were joined by Rachel Dring, Sustain, and Michael Calderbank, Islington Council Local Economies who facilitated discussions on themes relevant to their work.
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Local Access to Nature
Our November Community Conversation included a number of nature-based art activities, including making nature mobiles, bird feeders, fat balls and nature collage.
We ended this event with a discussion facilitated by local resident Judith, who has developed community growing spaces on her estate over the past 40 years.
Thanks to all those who have joined the Conversations over the past seven months, and shared your experiences, ideas, pledges and wishes. We’ll be using all of the conversations we’ve had to begin to create the Tufnell Park Nature Neighbourhoods framework.
If you think of any other ideas or have anything else you’d like to share, you’re welcome to email rosie@octopuscommunities.org.uk.
