16 Jun 2009

YOUNG GREEN FINGERS HELP TO RESTORE MAJOR LOCAL ASSET!

Pupils from Waterloo's three primary schools have shown off their green fingers and garden design skills in a special project in Marine Garden between South Road and the Royal Hotel.

Each school has planted a specially cleared section of the garden's roadside border to their own design as part of a "Community Champions" project sponsored with £1,000 from the Housing Market Renewal Initiative delivered through Crosby Housing and Maritime Housing Association (part of the Regenda Group) and match-funded with £500 each from Church Ward's councillors and Sefton's Coast and Countryside Department.

The schools - Waterloo Primary, St John's and St Edmund's & St Thomas' - have taken up the theme "Pride of Place" to champion Waterloo.

Last month they attended workshops run by the Waterloo Community Centre on the history of the district's seafront gardens compiled by Waterloo Residents' Association and St John's Local History Group, as well as on plant selection and garden design led by Sefton's new Park Ranger Service.

Due to availability and suitability the designs have been modified slightly by specialists from Sefton Council Leisure Services. Council horticultural experts bought the plants, which are mixed shrubs and herbaceous perennials chosen to bloom and develop year after year. All feature the schools' initials, spelt out in plants and flowers.

Planting took place last Wednesday (June 10) and the new beds will be formally inaugurated on July 9 by Cllr Alf Doran, the Mayor of Sefton, in a special ceremony sponsored by Sefton Extended Services.

Claire Lomas, HMRI's project officer for Waterloo and Seaforth, said: "We think this is a very good way of getting pupils in years three, four and five involved in helping to restore part of a major local asset. We hope it will give them a sense of ownership, respect and commitment that will never leave them as they grow up. Nothing could better demonstrate that the gardens, which are an important part of Waterloo's history, belong to all of us and we all have a part to play in taking care of them."