Green Action Plan moves a step closer

The Pennines Green Infrastructure Action Plan moved a step closer last night as it passed through the Pennines Township Committee. The plan, which was consulted upon in the spring of this year, is a long-term plan which is expected to be delivered over the next 26 years and will be dovetailed into the borough’s Local Development Framework together with other plans and strategies.

At the heart of the plan are 4 strategic projects:

• Pennines Greenways Network which seeks to improve accessibility by providing wider links to the countryside and services in the surrounding urban areas. Also co-ordinating and improving the access networks to provide clear links and routes to key tourism, leisure and countryside destinations. 
• Growing Greener Neighbourhoods by increasing the range of services, products and functions provided by green infrastructure enabling it to better meet the needs of the community; particularly for flood risk management, adapting to climate change, increasing biodiversity and improving health and wellbeing. 
• Visit Pennines: Widening the township’s visitor offer by improving and enhancing gateways to key attractions and promoting alternative ways of arriving in and travelling within the township such as exploiting the incoming Metrolink and National Cycle Route 66. 
• Roch Valley River Park. Creating a strategic environmental corridor through the core of the borough and providing essential green infrastructure to manage flood risk, conserve biodiversity and create an accessible network of landscape and visitor destinations for local communities and visitors stretching from the South Pennine Moors through central Rochdale and Heywood along the Roch Valley.

Emphasis on managing flood risk will be welcome news to residents and businesses along the Roch Valley who have suffered during this month’s heavy and persistent rainfall. It is envisaged that the plan will attract a range of grants and partnership funding opportunities.

The creation of a river park along the banks of the once heavily-polluted River Roch is something that would have been hard to envisage only a few years ago.

The recommendations contained in the report, considered by the committee say that there are no direct financial implications contained within the plan as it will ‘enhance opportunities to co-ordinate, target and attract investment in the local environment’.

http://www.rochdaleonline.co.uk/news-features/2/news-headlines/68803/pennines-green-infrastructure-action-plan-consultation-draft