• Urban Greenspace
  • Johnson Reserve
  • Fraser Street Reserve
  • Scantlebury Street Reserve
  • Argyll Road Reserve
  • Rudolf Steiner School Wetland
  • Mauao Reserve
  • Matahoroa Gully Reserve
  • Rotary Park Reserve
• Trees for Survival
• Conservation
• Weeds

Thanks to the Legacy Trust for their contribution in 2008, which allowed us to purchase a vehicle. We can now transport plants, tools, and other equipment to our working bees. Awesome!

How can you get involved?
 

Come along and meet yout local care group at a community working bee this year. Working bees are gernerally held monthly on Saturdays from 10am-12 noon from April-November.

Visit the Tauranga Environment Centre and offer your support in another way such as: donations of plants or other materials, financial support, new opportunities for care groups, volunteer admin support, and so on.
 

Our Background

The project began in 2005 after an application was successfully made to the Ministry for the Environment’s Sustainable Management Fund. Since then we successfully applied again and had funding from the Ministry until June 30 2009. From July 2008 we secured partial funding from Environment Bay of Plenty’s Environmental Enhancement Fund (EEF), but was not enough to sustain it. In August 2009 we handed the coordination role over to TCC and have used the remainder of the EEF money to begin coordinating the Trees for Survival Programme.

The Tauranga Environment Centre initiated UGP in response to requests from the community and we have successfully brought together the Tauranga City Council and Environment Bay of Plenty in partnership with the community. The project has also received significant in-kind support from local business, which have donated staff time, heavy machinery and plants for re-vegetation.

 

Welcome to the Homepage of the The Urban Greenspace Project

The Urban Greenspace Project provides opportunities for members of the Tauranga community of all ages, cultural and economic backgrounds to come together to adopt their park or reserve for ecological restoration (removal of weeds and planting of trees to attract bird life). The Environment Centre provided co-ordination, technical and administrative support to these groups, management of health and safety, and liaison with local government.
 

NEWS UPDATE

Due to the Environment Centre funding from the Ministry for the Environment coming to a natural end after four years, we no longer coordinate the project. The administration of the care groups is now in the hands of Tauranga City Council (TCC) staff, Josh Trafford and Dianne Paton.

We have agreed with the above that they will be able to help some care groups to run their own working bees. These groups are:
 

Reserve                Contact                Phone               Email 

Argyll Reserve           Freddy Brignone       541 2541              sixfootplus@hotmail.com
Fraser St Reserve      Ken Lees                 578 4326              kenlees@kinect.co.nz
Johnson Reserve       Meyric Bellerby         544 4427           
Mauao Reserve         Mark Ray (TCC)        577 7000              mark.ray@tauranga.govt.nz
                        OR   Elaine & Bill Beever  575 3797  
Rotary Park              Phil Collins               544 7143              phil.collins@clear.net.nz



Although working bees will not be held in all reserves, Council staff will look into starting maintenance contracts to maintain the substantial gains in pest plant control in the following reserves:
Lagoon Place, Taipari Gully and Scantlebury Street.

Care Group Leaders from other reserves will need to contact Council directly to find out what, if anything, can be done to facilitate ongoing community work in the reserves. The main point of contact for this is Dianne Paton, 07 577 7256.

The Environment Centre continues to review and plan for the future of this project, and may be able to re-launch Urban Greenspace, or a similar project, in the near future. We will keep you as informed and included as we possibly can, and we welcome your involvement and comments if you would like to meet with us and/or make any suggestions or proposals.

Achievements

To date nearly 4000 native plants have been planted and maintained by this project, with over 5000 volunteer hours donated by more than 200 individuals. This work includes the revegetation of Mauao, the ecologically significant Lagoon Place reserve, and numerous smaller neighbourhood reserves that provide active transport corridors and local green spaces in Tauranga

Funding

We are a charitable organisation run on a not-for-profit basis. There are current opportunities for:
 

•  Major sponsorship by local business to contribute to funding staff hours and overheads

• Minor sponsorship by local business to contribute to operating costs such as travel, promotion and materials.

UGP Aim

The Urban Greenspace Project has been supported by the following major sponsors: