Over the last five years, GreenBlue Urban have been delighted to partner with the urban tree planting super squad at City of Trees. The team have been instrumental in delivering high quality green infrastructure projects across the Greater Manchester area.
We often think of concepts such as the northern powerhouse and the regeneration of ambitious Northern metropolitan areas such as Manchester, Leeds and Liverpool as directly related to grey infrastructure, but the work of this organisation and the awareness they have raised across local authority boundaries in relation to high quality urban tree planting has acted as a catalyst. Councils, community organisations and a broad range of other stakeholders have all clearly demonstrated an increased commitment to ensuring that alongside growth, nature in our cities is not forgotten.
We have worked proactively with the City of Trees team to ensure that our unique support and our soil cell solutions have benefitted communities from city centre to residential contexts, so that everybody living across the Greater Manchester area has more access to higher quality green space and increased urban canopy cover.
A variety of our soil cell solutions including have been used in the following projects:-
However, we would like to highlight one particular project that we are all extremely proud of delivered in 2016. This was the planting of ten trees into GreenBlue Urban soil support systems on St Petersgate in Stockport. The tree pits were installed on the south elevation of the street. This project was delivered after an extensive process of engagement and consultation.
According to Peter Stringer, City Of Trees:
The trees were planted in large tree pits containing Green Blue Urban’s StrataCell system to prevent soil compaction and to provide a significant volume of growing space for the roots, which will enhance their growth capabilities and reduce root damage to the pavement. Three of the trees were planted in a connected 16 meter tree trench and expectations are high that these trees will have the space and soil needed to reach their full growth potential!
Feedback from a number of the businesses has been very positive and it has been noted that several of the void properties have been let since the trees were planted which perhaps indicates changing perceptions of the attractiveness and economic potential that the street now offers. It is also noted that the pavement is now being used by one of the new businesses as an outside dining space.
To discover more on City of Trees and their goal to plant 3 million trees across Greater Manchester – sign up to receive their e-news here!
