A river runs through it

By Ian Talboys, Trustee, Ury Riverside Park SCIO.

ury riverside Park is a 61 hectare community park for people and wildlife to enjoy together. the park is being developed by the community for the community from a former barley field to create somewhere special for wildlife and people. a great place to walk, jog, volunteer to help create habitats or watch wildlife.

the park has been developing over the last 6 years from former arable farmland on Tree planting.

the flood plain of the river ury in the heart of inverurie, approximately 15 miles northwest of aberdeen.

a group of local people came together to form a Scottish Charitable incorporated organisation (SCio) to take on the development of the park in collaboration with aberdeenshire Council who currently own the land. it is planned that the SCio will take on the ownership of the land through a Community asset transfer soon.

the objectives of the SCio are: the park is being developed with a highquality path network, areas of semi-natural wetland, riparian habitats, new native woodlands, wildflower meadows and amenity grassland. an all-abilities play area and a local granite feature entrance are planned. most of the park lies below the 200-year flood level and much of the park floods every year. this has to be taken account of for all the site works. the SCio has had to source the funding to design and deliver all the site works. to date this has been a mix including developer obligations, eu leader, Scottish forestry Grants, inverurie Community Council and inverurie faith groups. the most important element of the development of the park is the community engagement and volunteering commitment of the local people. our achievements so far include:

• The advancement and improvement of ury riverside Park.

• Develop recreational facilities that are accessible.

• Enhance the biodiversity and amenity.

• To be open and inclusive to appropriate community events.

• 3km of flood resistant paths have been constructed by contractors.

• 11.75ha of wet wildflower meadow sown and maintained.

• 109,000 wetland wildflower plugs planted.

• 14ha of amenity grass sown and maintained.

• 4ha of native woodland planted (over 4,000 trees) by 70+ volunteers, including oak, rowan, holly, crab apple, birch, gean, alder, hazel, hawthorn and blackthorn.

• 6 interpretation and orientation panels designed and installed.

• 2 refurbished benches installed with funding from local people and the rotary Club of inverurie.

• Purchase of local repurposed granite for a feature entrance to the park to be built later this year.

• Installation of two noticeboards funded by the Garioch Partnership.

The park supports breeding skylarks (15+ pairs), common partridge, reed buntings, yellowhammers, and sedge warblers to name a few. otters and trout live in the river along with a range of dragonflies and damselflies. the wildflower meadows are attracting a range of butterflies, bees, and the winners are…. the efforts of the ury riverside Park SCio and the local community were recognised by winning the Community initiative award in the prestigious 2022 nature of Scotland awards, co-sponsored by rSPB Scotland and NatureScot. On 17 November, Ian talboys, group trustee, and martin auld, group Chair, travelled to edinburgh to attend the awards Ceremony hosted by naturalist and tV presenter iolo Williams and broadcaster arlene Stuart. ian and martin received the Community initiative award from robert forrest, Chief executive of GreenPower, the category sponsors.

Pictured from left to right are Iolo Williams, Robert Forrest, Ian Talboys, Martin Auld and Arlene Stuart. mike WilkinSon hoverflies and many other species to an area that was previously just a barley monoculture. We are aiming to create habitats that will function naturally with minimal management intervention. the park has also proved a popular location for weekly parkrun events where people run or walk a measured 5km route. these are attracting 200-300 runners each week since starting in november 2019. these runs are managed by a local group of volunteers too. the ury riverside Park has achieved the highest Its Your Neighbourhood Level 5 Award in 2021 and 2022. you can find out more about ury riverside Park at our website or on our facebook page.

We think that ury riverside Park is unique, providing a large area of accessible seminatural habitats on the active flood plain of a river at the heart of a Scottish town.