Greater Anglia pledges to help improve wildlife habitats at stations
The train operator's offering space for gardens at train stations in the region.
Greater Anglia has joined the WildEast movement which has pledged to return 20% of the region back to nature by 2050.
The train operator is offering to help by offering more than 6,400 square metres, the equivalent of five Olympic-sized swimming pools, for wildlife habitats.
Gardens are going to be built at 56 stations across the rail network in the East.
The WildEast movement is hoping that 1.25m people in the region will join their cause to help reverse the decline in native wildlife in the East.
It says that since 1970, many species have suffered, including: tree sparrows whose numbers have fallen by 85%, common toads down by 68%, nightingales 93%, and hedgehogs whose numbers are down from 30 million to just 1 million.
WildEast aims to reverse this decline by asking everyone, including farming estates, industrial estates, housing estates, schools, gardens, allotments and churchyards, to give whatever land they can back to nature.
This can mean planting wildlife friendly areas or simply leaving the land as space for nature.
Argus Hardy, one of the WildEast founders said: “Having Greater Anglia on board with WildEast is incredibly exciting and we are very proud to be able share their journey as they become part of a wilder Greater Anglia and a wilder east.
“The WildEast is aiming to inspire a regional culture change in wildlife recovery that everyone can engage with, whatever their scale and land use.
"Not just farms and farmyards but backyards, schoolyards, churchyards and across all businesses.
"Central to this has been what we have called the Map of Dreams, a co-creational space where we record and celebrate nature recovery projects.
"Through the work of Greater Anglia and other exemplars we hope to encourage everyone to be inspired, get involved and add their pledge to the map.”
Greater Anglia’s Customer and Community Engagement Manager, Alan Neville, said: “We’re absolutely delighted to pledge our station gardens to the WildEast movement as part of our desire to be at the forefront of the region’s green recovery from the pandemic.
“Rail is already the greenest way to travel, but thanks to the care and attention of our team of station adopter volunteers, we also have thousands upon thousands of plants and wildflowers thriving at our rail stations which helps not only to make them more welcoming, but is contributing to biodiversity and helping to support fragile wildlife populations locally too.”
Greater Anglia’s team of station adopters – who help to look after their rail stations for the benefit of their communities – increased the total area of station garden across the network by 14% last year and devoted much of it to creating wildlife friendly areas.