Queens Park is lit green to celebrate parks in the city with a Green Flag

Central Parks, St James’s Park and Riverside Park have received the prestigious Green Flag Award this year

Southampton City Council lights Queens Park green to show support for high quality green spaces and the fantastic staff and volunteers that maintain them. It was also to celebrate receiving the prestigious Green Flag Award for three of its city parks; Central Parks, St James’s Park and Riverside Park.

The Green Flag Award scheme, managed by environmental charity Keep Britain Tidy under licence from the Ministry of Housing, Communities and Local Government, recognises and rewards well-managed parks and green spaces, setting the benchmark standard for their management across the United Kingdom and around the world.

On Wednesday 14th October, Queens Park joined buildings and landmarks across the country, including the White Cliffs of Dover at Samphire Hoe, the London Stadium in Queen Elizabeth Olympic Park and Salford’s Media City, by going green for parks to celebrate Southampton’s Green Flag Award success and to say a thank you to the parks staff, volunteers and the Green Flag Award Judges for all their work this year.

Southampton City Council chose to light Queens Park green, as it is the first park in the city to benefit from colour-changing LED street lights. The smart lighting was designed as part of the Street Lighting Private Finance Initiative (SLPFI), a collaboration between Southampton City Council and Tay Valley Lighting with services delivered by SSE Enterprise Contracting. The colour changing functionality is provided by Mayflower CMS, a smart lighting system that uses remote control capability to change output colours between a selection of 16 colour choices, as specified by the council.

Councillor Steve Leggett, Cabinet Member for Green City & Place comments: “We’re proud to be lighting Queens Park green to celebrate our high-quality green spaces and the fantastic staff and volunteers that maintain them. Our parks and open spaces are essential to creating a cleaner, greener, healthier city and in a year where having quality green spaces on our doorstep has been more important than ever, it’s great that our Central parks, Riverside Park and James’s Park have been awarded this fantastic accolade.”

Simon Bushell, Lighting Design Manager at SSE Enterprise Contracting said: “By using the LED lighting, Southampton City Council are able to alter the look and feel of Queens Park’s lighting throughout the year, choosing from a range of 16 colours across the RGB spectrum to create many different visual effects. The contemporary scheme will encourage more people to visit the park to see the changing lights and enhances the welcoming feel of the park and its landscape.”

The SLPFI partnership focuses on maintaining and operating lights in the city to a very high standard whilst looking at future innovation and technology. Recently, the iconic Bargate Monument, a Grade 1 listed medieval gatehouse had new smart lighting installed. The architectural lighting was replaced with a bespoke LED solution to efficiently enhance the characteristics of the castle.

More information about the Street Lighting Private Finance Initiative.