The Wirral Waters Sustainability Action Hub is set to receive £1.75m of Government funding, through the Birkenhead Town Deal project. This collaborative facility will enable partners and the community to work together, share, innovate, train, and learn about all things relating to sustainability.
The Hub will be developed within and surrounding the vacant 1960’s NorthWest Ship Repairers building at West Float, which will be fully converted, retrofitted and extended. The plans incorporate indoor and outdoor facilities, with shared workspaces, an outdoor classroom, a ‘reuse’ hub and shop, an outdoor gym, raised growing beds, beehives, energy and construction workshops, and an events space, as well as ‘wetland’ gardens and a tree-nursery.
Cycleways, including the Greenway project, will connect the Hub to the surrounding neighbourhoods and the local public transport network, with electric charging points provided for electric vehicles and eCycles.
Ten ‘step-change’ actions, based around the United Nation’s (UN) Sustainable Development Goals, were unveiled by Peel L&P in April as part of its Sustainability Action Plan. The Sustainability Hub is a key part of this plan and more details can be found in the Plan.
The Wirral Waters Sustainability Action Plan ensures that sustainability and the environment continue to be embedded into each part of the development at Wirral Waters with the aim that it can fulfil its potential as one of the most sustainable regeneration projects in the UK.
Richard Mawdsley, Peel L&P’s director of development for Wirral Waters, said: “The Sustainability Hub will be a fabulous space for people to meet and share ideas, as well as a place to innovate and learn practical sustainability skills. It will bring together different partners who want to come and work with others on projects of varying scales, at a local city region or national level.
“Genuine collaboration and partnership working between the public, private, third sector and community groups is what we have always sought to achieve at Wirral Waters. Together we can take action and inspire change so that the vision of Wirral as a sustainable and resilient place will become a reality for the long term.”
The Wirral Waters Sustainability Action Hub proposals are being led by Parkinson Inc, the masterplanner for Wirral Waters, through collaboration with national, regional and local partners, including Centre for Alternative Technology (CAT), Energy Projects Plus, UTS Foundation, GROW-Wellbeing CIC, LettUs GROW and Farm Urban, ReciproCity Wirral, Wirral Met College, Liverpool John Moores University, the University of Liverpool, and Merseyside Recycling & Waste Authority.
