News on Surrey's Greener Future

This week marks Love Parks week, an event to recognise the value of parks and outdoor spaces. We’re taking this opportunity to celebrate the amazing green spaces we have across Surrey and provide some inspiration to get us all out in parks over this week.

Parks in Surrey

In 2022, 22 Surrey parks received prestigious green flag awards with Guildford having the most green flag parks in the county. These awards are designed to raise the standards of parks and green spaces in the UK and reward the best ones.

Surrey is one of England’s most wooded county with 22.4% of Surrey being covered by woodland.

We are currently in the early stages of developing a Local Nature Recovery Strategy to identify locations to improve nature and provide other environmental benefits. Parks could play a big role as biodiversity hotspots/corridors protecting wildlife by providing habitat as they are a huge part of parks and improving access to green space for health and wellbeing as Surrey is mainly green with its countryside.

We’re very lucky to have an abundance of greenspace across Surrey, check out this article 12 glorious parks in Surrey to sunbathe and picnic for free on a sunny day - Surrey Live (getsurrey.co.uk)

The great outdoors

There are many great benefits of spending time in nature. Firstly, it can reduce stress which can have a positive effect on other areas of your life, allowing you to feel more relaxed. Also, getting out and about can increase how active you are which can improve and physical health and wellbeing.

Preserving biodiversity in green spaces is vital, and there are many associated benefits just to name a few; trees absorb carbon dioxide and give us oxygen to breathe, and healthy ecosystems provide us with food to eat.

It’s also vital to protect animal and insect species as without pollinators like bees we’d have less food crops available. Having a diverse variety of habitats is important as they provide different benefits; for example, large plants, and wetland habitats naturally slow down rainfall and help the soil gradually absorb an optimum amount of water.

Keeping our parks free of litter

Love Parks week have their own annual campaign for this week, 28th July to 6th August, which have been going on for a number of years, that celebrate parks and green space. These spaces are a way of bringing communities together and provide an opportunity to connect with nature. The link below has more information about the event and how you can get involved.

Love Parks Week | Keep Britain Tidy