URBAN parks? Nasty places — full of broken bottles, wild dogs and wilder children. Aren’t they? Not in Rotherham, where Paul Spriggs, an evangelist for urban spaces, has been named Britain’s best park worker. He won the parkie Oscar for helping to restore the 23-acre Rosehill Victoria Park after years of neglect.
Children Now (Sept 6) says that the park was beset by the usual problems: under-age drinking, smoking, public intimidation and litter.
But then up sprung Spriggs, a former teacher who took a pay cut to become a park development officer. “There has been a culture of not using parks and the minority of people who did hang out there fostered a fear of crime,” he says.
In two years he has turned the park around, building a junior ranger scheme to give the kids a sense of ownership and setting up a confidential helpline to encourage the reporting of bad behaviour.
Tackling litter was a simple way of making the park more attractive and a range of activities such as juggling workshops and bird-box building has helped to entice back families.
Advertisement
“A park can be at the heart of a community,” says Spriggs. “It becomes so much more than just a green space.”