Scott Avenue and Cole Avenue Green Space Regeneration

Long-term community-led plans for Podsmead’s key green spaces

The Scott Avenue and Cole Avenue green spaces are two of the most important open spaces within Podsmead. They have previously formed part of wider regeneration proposals for the estate, including Gloucester City Homes’ planning application 24/00412/FUL for the Podsmead Estate regeneration scheme.

That application was ultimately refused. A key reason for this was concern around the loss of large urban green spaces. Although residents clearly hold attachment to these spaces, there remains a persistent perception that they are currently poor in quality, underused, and can attract negative behaviour.

The challenge is therefore not simply to protect the spaces as they are, but to help them become better, more welcoming and more useful places for the community.

Gloucestershire Wildlife Trust has identified Scott Avenue and Cole Avenue as part of the wider Neighbourhood Nature focus in Podsmead. The aim is to develop a flagship, joint stakeholder project capable of delivering large-scale, community-shaped change to these spaces over the long term.

This would be developed alongside partners including Gloucester City Council, Gloucester City Homes, Blackbridge Community Group and other local stakeholders.

What the project is trying to do

The long-term aim is to turn the Scott Avenue and Cole Avenue green spaces into higher-quality community green spaces, shaped by local people and supported by the organisations that own, manage or work within the area.

The project will seek to:

• protect the role of these spaces as important urban green spaces;
• improve their quality, appearance and sense of safety;
• create spaces that better support play, health, food-growing, nature and community use;
• build on community-created designs rather than imposing a finished plan from above;
• create a stronger shared vision between residents, GWT, GCH, Gloucester City Council and Blackbridge Community Group;
• use the community design process as the basis for a future joint funding bid.

A community-created design process

Rather than beginning with a fixed design, GWT will use both in-person and online consultation to help residents create their own ideas for the future of the spaces.

This could include ideas for wildlife-rich planting, food-growing areas, orchard or edible landscape features, improved paths and seating, play and informal recreation, safer entrances, outdoor community spaces, and better links between the green spaces and surrounding streets.

The intention is to make the design process open, creative and community-led, while still producing ideas that can be turned into a practical long-term plan.

The community-created designs will be reviewed by project partners, including relevant landholders and local stakeholders. A shortlist of realistic and deliverable design options will then be selected and put back to the community for a public vote.

The winning community design will be passed to a landscape architect, who will turn the preferred idea into a more formal design that can be costed, tested and used for future funding applications.

The final design will then form the basis of a joint funding bid for the long-term regeneration of the Scott Avenue and Cole Avenue green spaces.

GWT will be hosting in-person consultation and design events from July to August. These sessions will give local residents the chance to share ideas, create designs, discuss what they would like to see in the spaces, and help shape the future of Scott Avenue and Cole Avenue green spaces.

There will also be an online design consultation for residents who cannot attend in person or who would prefer to take part digitally.

Follow the link below to our Podsmead Design Platform to create your own ideas for the spaces online. The platform works best on Laptop or PC

Here’s what one of our officers made