Covid pandemic prompts a surge in appreciation for local nature and rewilding cities – iNews

The look and feel of our city centres could be about to change significantly, after people took the opportunity this year to flock to the nature on their doorstep however scrubby it might be as never before.

The Covid-propelled flight into wildlife has accelerated a change in attitude to nature that was already occurring and could profoundly change the make-up of urban areas in the next decade.

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According to Craig Bennett, head of the Wildlife Trusts, the conservation movement is being radically reshaped as the century-old focus on honey pot sites of great natural beauty often in a far and distant land is switching to the more modest wildlife near our houses.

Only a decade ago, when Bennett was at Friends of the Earth, people thought that letting the grass grow long on roadside verges was madness, he recalls.

But in recent years, helped by campaigns and scientific research extolling the benefits of biodiversity for nature and our mental health, people are coming around strongly to the idea that messy is good.

This conversion has prompted a growing interest in rewilding essentially, letting nature take its course from the environmental fringes towards the mainstream.

While the first rewilding schemes took place in the depths of the countryside, milder forms are starting to crop up in urban areas.

More recently, Covid has hugely increased the publics appreciation of nature as they sought solace in green space when restrictions often left them with little else to do.

And because they couldnt travel easily, they focused on that park they may have overlooked for years even though it was just down the road.

The result is an increased interest in local, rewilded, nature, however low-key, according toBennett.

Thousands of UK households took part in No Mow May this year, letting their lawns grow wild, while the Royal Entomological Society reported record numbers of enquiries from people in the UK and overseas over the summer about insects they had spotted.

Meanwhile, in the US, 26 per cent of people visiting parks and natural areas in the early months of the pandemic had rarely and often never been in nature in the previous year, according to a study published in the journal Plos One last week.

Against this backdrop, it is perhaps not surprising that an ambitious proposal to rewild Nottingham city centre, made this month by the Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust, received a lot of attention and the city council is seriously considering it.

We have seen a real change in the zeitgeist in the British public in the past 10 years people are starting to understand now that messy is good. Its good for wildlife and it makes you feel more connected to nature, says Bennett.

There is a big reframing of the conservation movement from the way its been for the past 100 years. Nature is often talked about as though its distant and sometimes even foreign, such as rainforests, and as a result thousands of people charge to those kind of honey pot sites every year.

Now, people are getting excited about local nature, where they live or can walk or cycle to. People are starting to celebrate and understand, not perhaps the most spectacular nature, but the nature close to where they are. I think thats a definite shift, and that then leads to that massive interest in urban rewilding.

Mr Bennett expects this new-found love of local, messy nature to transform the look of UK city centres and other urban spaces in the coming years.

There is a move towards having big areas of rewilding in the country, but also having rewilding around our towns and cities. There is a lot of excitement about what it could look like in 10 or 15 years we could fundamentally change what it looks like to travel round this country, he says.

People are very excited about this change. I think its the one that can surprise us over the next decade about just how much progress we can make on it.

Only 10 years ago, when campaigners talked about allowing roadside verges to grow a little bit wild or putting wildflowers into public spaces, people thought we were mad. It was absolutely normal at the time to see manicured lawns absolutely everywhere. These days, people get it when they see roadside verges that have been left to grow wild.

And wild areas in our towns and cities are incredibly popular among members of the public.

The publics personal love of nature notwithstanding, arguably an even more significant development in recent years concerns money.

It wasnt so long ago that it was environment versus economy, says Bennett. Youre not hearing that now.

Whats great about that Nottingham rewilding story is that local business, the council and the people are saying it will be good for their local economy the idea that we need to rewild parts of Nottingham city centre because we need good-qualitygreen space to make it an attractive place to live and work and for people to invest.

Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust has challenged the city of Nottingham to rewild the site of Broadmarsh shopping centre once its demolition is completed.

It has reimagined the space transformed with wildlife habitats reflecting the sites history as a wetland alongside the ancient course of the River Leen and long-lostgardens.

The vision for the site includes accessible walkways based on a centuries-old city street plan to reconnect key parts of the city.

It hopes this could help to reconnect the city to Sherwood Forest and invoke the spirit of Robin Hood bringing wildlife to nature-poor city dwellers and the millions of visitors it attracts. The council is considering the proposal, along with others for the Broadmarsh site.

The River Sherbourne might run through Coventry, but it is mostly culverted and almost forgotten. Warwickshire Wildlife Trusts new project aims to reconnect people who live in the city with the river and restore it for wildlife. In the city centre, the lid will be taken off a section of the culverted river, which will also be brought to the surface in other ways, through virtual reality, listening posts, glass floors and a blue line marking the route it takes beneath the feet of passers-by.

Meanwhile, the Government will be guilty of speaking a lot of hot air on climate change if it fails to produce a detailed action plan to hit its emissions targets by the time it hosts the crucial COP26 global warming summit next December, Bennett warned.

The UK is on course to miss its various climate change targets and lacks the policies needed, he says.

Last month, the Government announced a 10-point green revolution plan. This included pledges to ban the sale of new diesel and petrol cars by 2030, to quadruple offshore wind power within a decade and to boost hydrogen production.

A 165-page White Paper published this week adds further proposals.

However, there is still no detailed analysis laying out the specific measures that need to be taken to meet our carbon goals and showing how much they add up to achieve them, Bennett says.

Meanwhile, an in-depth analysis of the White Paper by the Carbon Brief climate science and policy website concluded: Even with the wealth of additional detail in the White Paper, there remains a significant gap between proposed emissions cuts and those required under the UKs climate targets.

Mr Bennett said: If we were hosting the Olympics in 2030, youd expect us to have a clear plan of how wed deliver it, with Gantt charts, project plans and milestones through to delivery.

We need exactly the same way of delivering on these climate targets, and, despite all the good talk, at the moment we dont have that detailed plan.

We surely need that to be in place, adopted as policy by the Government and supported by Parliament, before we host COP26. Without it, those targets will prove to be a lot of hot air.

COP26 has been billed as a crucial summit for international leaders to agree how to limit global warming to the Paris Agreement target of1.5C.

A Government spokesman said: This is nonsense. Building on the Prime Ministers ambitious 10-point plan, the energy White Paper sets out specific steps we take to fully decarbonise our electricity system and slash emissions from industry, transport and buildings as we transition to net-zero [for electricity] by 2025.

This is part of a suite of bold plans across key sectors of the economy which the government will be publishing in the run up to COP26, culminating with a comprehensive Net Zero Strategy.

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Covid pandemic prompts a surge in appreciation for local nature and rewilding cities - iNews