Urban Green Newcastle was committed to improving the scope and opportunity for people to get out and enjoy the parks and allotments, and in 2020 the charity agreed a Memorandum of Understanding with Newcastle City Council to deliver a programme of sports and physical activity.
Urban Green Newcastle appointed a dedicated Sports and Activities Officer, and through this and related activities, brought in over £860,000 in new funding to benefit health and wellbeing. Since 2021 nearly 12,000 people took part in additional activities provided or supported by Urban Green Newcastle, with many more benefitting from improved facilities.
Activity included:
- Working with the Elders Council to install appropriate exercise equipment for the older generation
- Providing wellbeing activities for NHS staff and patients at Springbank Pavilion in Leazes Park
- Partnering with the Office of the Police and Crime Commissioner on a programme of ‘Safer Parks for Women and Girls’ events and delivering improvements in Leazes Park
- Developing an annual Blossom Festival with the National Trust to encourage people to unwind with nature.
Play area renewal
The majority of the play areas inherited from Newcastle City Council in 2019 were nearing the end of their natural lives. The charity invested over £550,000 in capital improvement works to repair and improve facilities, but play provision across the estate remains in need of around £3 million in major investment.
To raise additional funding for play area improvements, Urban Green Newcastle worked in partnership with local communities and local businesses on various volunteering and crowdfunding campaigns.
- In 2021 the local community in Heaton raised an incredible £21,000 to replace arson-damaged play equipment in Heaton Park. An additional £4,000 was donated via local businesses, Friends of Groups, and Ward Councillors.
- In Gosforth Central Park, the local shopping centre and local community (led by Gosforth Play Park) partnered with the charity to raise much needed funds to repair the play area. Teachers and students from Gosforth Academy also volunteered their time to repaint some of the play equipment. This initiative has continued, with the community working successfully to raise funds for a new play area.
- In Elswick Park, the local community voted for the equipment they would like to replace following an arson attack. The charity also partnered with a local professional cleaning company who generously volunteered their time to carry out a deep clean of some play areas.
- Working with Newcastle City Council, a number of play area improvements were funded from the Airport Dividend. They included Chelmsford Grove, Armstrong Park and Elswick Park playgrounds.
- And in Leazes Park, a crowdfunding campaign spearheaded by Northern Lights Newcastle and delivered in partnership with Urban Green Newcastle raised £21,000 to repair and reopen popular pieces of play equipment for local families and visitors.
Sports
With a dedicated Sports and Activities Officer in post, Urban Green Newcastle initiated multiple projects and partnerships to improve the sports facilities across the city’s parks and encourage people to get outdoors and active.
By the time of the charity’s closure, Urban Green Newcastle was actively exploring more options for activities such as cricket, running tracks, chess, and extreme frisbee. The charity was also keen to build on its collaboration with the Council’s Public Health team to help address the wider determinants of health in the city.
Improvements to park tennis courts
Urban Green Newcastle secured £188,000 of investment from UK Government and LTA Tennis Foundation’s Park Tennis Project to refurbish public tennis courts across all the parks in Newcastle – resulting in a huge uplift in people playing.
Urban Green Newcastle established a partnership with We Do Tennis to operate the courts. The success of the partnership led to the creation of the first beginner’s tennis league in the country, a regional LTA award for We Do Tennis in 2025, and a nomination for a national LTA Tennis Award.
parkrun UK
Urban Green Newcastle supported the roll out of the hugely popular parkruns in a number of the city’s parks, which have now become firm fixtures. The charity also supported the Friends of Denton Dene to introduce a new weekly parkrun to their local green space.
Football
In 2023, Urban Green Newcastle secured over £70,000 from the Premier League, the FA, and the Government’s Football Foundation – along with donations from Heaton Stannington Football Club and the Friends of Paddy Freeman’s Park – to improve football pitches in Walker Park and Paddy Freeman’s Park. The investment enabled partnerships with teams including Walker Central Football Club and Heaton Stannington F.C., offering high-quality pitches for training and matches. Local communities also continue to enjoy these green spaces for football and other sports.
A partnership with Newcastle City Council and Sport England led to the installation of an ‘interactive’ football wall at City Stadium. In 2024, an estimated 130,984 calories were burned playing against it.
The success of Urban Green Newcastle’s approach led to an awards nomination by the Football Association for the charity’s partnership working with the Northumberland Football Association.
Tag rugby
Launched in Paddy Freeman’s Park in 2024, the initiative encouraged over 100 participants to take part in 10 sessions.
Walking and cycling
The provision of good quality, accessible paths are essential for people to be able to enjoy walking or cycling within Newcastle’s parks. The invaluable support of regular volunteer groups, Friends groups and partnerships with organisations such as the Skill Mill and Probation Service meant that hundreds of kilometres of paths could be kept accessible and in good condition.
A range of walks were promoted through the charity’s website, and in 2021 Urban Green Newcastle developed a national pilot with Take Ten Minutes for self-guided mindfulness and mental health walks around selected parks. This proved to be very important during the COVID 19 pandemic.
A series of wellbeing walks were also delivered in partnership with Newcastle City Council’s Public Health team and RISE, and the charity partnered with local providers to encourage cycling.
In 2022, Urban Green Newcastle partnered with the national walking and cycling charity, Sustrans, to deliver a £477,000 upgrade to the popular Hadrian’s Cycleway walking and cycling route in Tyne Riverside Country Park and Walker Riverside Park. Part of the UK-wide programme to create Paths for Everyone along the National Cycle Network, the works not only widened and resurfaced sections of the network, they also ensured it remained suitable for horse riders, and incorporated tree planting, interpretation and wild flower meadows.
Activating the parks
Newcastle’s parks and green spaces play host to a diverse range of activities and events – everything from popular music and horticulture to local food and drink and community celebrations. Events not only provide a shared experience for residents across Newcastle, they also attract tourism to the city, which supports hundreds of local businesses. Many events bring younger audiences into the parks too, introducing them to other experiences they can take part in, like tennis, basketball, and parkruns.
Urban Green Newcastle appointed a small and extremely skilled Events Team to oversee the development and expansion of festivals, events and activities in the city’s parks. As of 2024, there were over 2,000 activities taking place each year, ranging from arts and craft sessions, Tai Chi, outdoor theatre, community dance, parkruns, and stargazing. The majority were free and open to families, and Urban Green Newcastle worked hard to establish partnerships, work with benefactors, and source funding to keep costs low and offer free tickets to disadvantaged communities or groups, such as NHS staff and patients.
To limit the impact of events on Newcastle’s parks infrastructure, Urban Green Newcastle required all major event organisers to carry out an assessment of their environmental impact. In the small number of instances where damage did occur, Urban Green Newcastle worked closely with the event organisers to mitigate and quickly repair any damage done.
The diverse range of events in Newcastle’s parks included large festivals like the Newcastle Allotment and Garden Festival, as well as small-scale community gatherings like Walker Youth Dance Festival, Blossom Together and Nature Makers. Urban Green Newcastle also worked in partnership with Newcastle City Council and a wide range of partners to host popular annual events in the city’s green spaces, including Newcastle Mela, Newcastle Pride, Noughty 90’s Festival, and Lost Minds.
In 2023, Urban Green Newcastle welcomed Northern Lights Newcastle to Leazes Park – a brand new light trail featuring immersive visuals, audio and illuminations. In its first year, the event attracted rave reviews and had more than 100,000 visitors over a five-week run, hugely supporting the city’s economy in the run-up to Christmas. The event was so popular, it returned in 2024.
To ensure communities across the city could access the wide range of events taking place in their local park and throughout Newcastle’s green spaces, Urban Green Newcastle created a comprehensive ‘What’s on’ calendar, which sat on the charity’s website. Regularly updated by the events team, it provided a one-stop-shop for information on all the events – both big and small – taking place in Newcastle’s parks.
The majority of events in Newcastle’s parks were community-led and open to people of all ages, backgrounds and abilities. The diverse events programme helped people discover and enjoy green space across the city.
Springbank Pavilion
With funding from the LGA Foundation and the Community Foundation, and a successful partnership with Newcastle Hospitals Charity, Urban Green Newcastle refurbished Springbank Pavilion in Leazes Park and reopened it as a new community arts venue in 2022.
Since then, it has hosted an exciting programme of creative events, including on-site workshops with local arts organisations, educational sessions, and activities designed to be completed from a hospital bed for those unable to visit in person.
To complement the initiative, Urban Green Newcastle also planted a wildflower border around the nearby bowling green as part of its Beelines North East project, inspiring immersive nature walks, creative arts, and poetry and prose writing.
