feature: Top marks for parks
5 February 2008
Haringey's parks are more popular with residents than ever before. And a new £4 million improvement programme is set to transform yet another of the borough’s open spaces.
It was once known for its boggy surfaces and crumbling pavilion. But Markfield Park in Seven Sisters could soon be joining the list of Haringey Council’s award-winning parks.
The council has been awarded £1.5 million funding from the Heritage Lottery Fund to help turn the park in Crowland Road into one of the best open spaces in the borough.
That money, which follows earlier funding awards from the Football Foundation and the government, will enable Haringey to carry out major drainage works and improvements to listed buildings in the park.
The council is contributing £425,000 of its own budget towards the improvements, which also include a new amphitheatre for performances, a state-of-the-art children’s play area and a new café.
These will benefit not only existing residents, but also the thousands of people expected to move into the planned Hale Village development and other housing proposed under the Tottenham Hale Masterplan.
The council hopes the improvements will also enable the park to receive Green Flag status by 2010, adding to the eight existing Green Flag parks in the borough – the joint highest number for any London borough.
The new funding for Markfield is a further boost to Haringey after a survey showed more residents are satisfied with the borough’s parks than ever before.
The 2007 Parks User Survey showed that 70 per cent of Haringey residents are satisfied with the condition of parks and their facilities – five per cent above the national average and an increase of 11 per cent since 2003.
There has also been increasing year-on-year satisfaction with cleanliness, grass cutting, flowers, toilets, play areas, seats and bins and signs over the past four years.
Meanwhile, the percentage of people who say they feel safe or very safe in the borough’s parks has increased to 77 per cent, up from 70 per cent in the last survey in 2006 and 66 per cent in the 2005 survey.
Haringey has more than 600 acres of parks and open spaces. Find out more at www.haringey.gov.uk/greenspaces or contact the parks customer care line on 020 8489 5662 or email parkscustomercare@haringey.gov.uk
Tour parks online
Residents can now explore two more of Haringey’s most popular parks without venturing outdoors. Haringey Council has introduced online virtual tours of Priory Park, N8, and Bruce Castle Park, N17, on a dedicated website: www.seeharingeyparks.org. It follows the launch of a Finsbury Park virtual tour in December 2006.
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