Springfield Park

March 2024

**Imagery of the park including MUGA, reserve football pitches and new children’s playground**

Play area now open!

We are delighted to announce that the play area is now open for children and the local community to enjoy. More info.

Our teams are continuing to work exceptionally hard on finishing the redevelopment of Springfield Park.

The Multi Use Games Area (MUGA), Trim Trail and Forest School are all completed and being used regularly which is great to see. The MUGA is free to use for all in the community to enjoy and is floodlit, which means it can be used from 9am till 10pm each day.

**Members of the Alder Hey Youth Forum enjoying the MUGA** and Trim Trail

Our planting scheme for the park is also well underway; around 150 trees are being planted throughout the park, with over 350 trees of several types and sizes to be planted overall. Our planting strategy will increase biodiversity and the health of local wildlife by creating a mosaic of different habitats within the park.

**Over 350 trees are being planted as part of the Park redevelopment**

An agreement was reached with Liverpool City Council for the provision of lighting to the main routes within the park. We know this was an important feature for many of you. The Trust has provided the capital cost for the supply and installation of the lighting. A large part of the lighting scheme has now been connected, with more to follow as we reach completion.

The park is expected to be complete in Spring 2024.

We remain grateful for your patience as we continue to do all we can to complete the park and return it to the community.

Play Park

We are delighted that the new Springfield Park play area is now officially open.

The fantastic new play area offers a whole host of features such as durable impact-absorbent surfaces to help protect children and young people from injuries, small and large multi-activity units to provide an opportunity to play for children and young people of all ages, and interactive play panels that produce enhanced sensory experiences.

The accessible seesaw, which was kindly donated by Friends of Springfield Park to the community, has also been relocated from the original playground and is now sitting within the new play park for children and young people to continue to enjoy.

Other features of the new play area include:

Colourful, textural and durable equipment
Infant, junior and inclusive swings
Inclusive roundabout
Seesaws and rocking items
Natural elements to enhance design and increase play value
Traditional play equipment such as swings, and slides, along with more contemporary and challenging equipment for older children

Take a video tour of the new play area

Watch the below video for a quick walk around tour of the fantastic new Springfield Park play area!

Click here to display content from YouTube.
Learn more in YouTube’s privacy policy.

Always display content from YouTube

We are sorry that this has taken longer than we had hoped to open and are grateful to the community for their patience. We are delighted that the new play area can now be enjoyed by everyone in the community.

Football Pitches

The grass is growing well on the pitches and we will be installing the drainage as soon as the weather permits. As previously stated, the grass needs a significant period of establishment before being played upon and so we began seeding as soon as we could. We recognise that when we install the drainage, we may need to dig up parts of the pitches where grass has grown, but we have plans to remediate these areas, as necessary. We remain committed to ensuring the pitches (along with the rest of the park) are of the highest quality before handing them over to the community.

Drainage

An example image of a swale. — **Images of swales – *these are examples and for illustration only**

Another example image of a swale. — **Images of swales – *these are examples and for illustration only**

The planning submission for the Park outlines a strategy to drain the football pitches and playgrounds via a land drainage system into a park swale. There has always been a real challenge with drainage across the Park site and swales were identified and recommended as the most suitable and effective solution to reduce the risk of potential waterlogging and flooding. Swales are a sustainable and environmentally friendly drainage solution as they provide a natural habitat for local wildlife while also reducing water run-off.

This is the approved drainage solution for the park and must be delivered as part of the planning conditions. Alder Hey will remain responsible for its maintenance until such time when it is adopted by United Utilities, who we are still working with to obtain formal approval.

Following feedback from FoSP and the local community, we have reviewed the design of the planned swale and tried to find solutions which would enable us to reduce its size while also maintaining its suitability to provide the drainage required.

We believe we have now identified an effective solution, by removing the section that runs adjacent to the Multi Use Games Area. This would also allow us to retain the three willow trees which we recognise are important to the local community.

However, this change to the original design will need approval from Liverpool Council and Liverpool Planning Authority before we can proceed and we have now submitted revised plans to both for the reduction of the swale and the retention of the willow trees.

**The reinforced barrier that closes off the loop line from Springfield Park**

We continue to work with Friends of Springfield Park, Liverpool City Council and Merseyside Police in exploring ways to tackle anti-social behaviour. This includes strengthening the fence from the existing Springfield Park to the loop line. Hedges have also been installed to further reinforce the barrier.

Portico

A structural assessment of the Portico highlighted some structural safety issues. We are still exploring potential future use of the Portico but in the meantime, essential repairs will begin later this month to make it structurally safe.

Histopathology building

This building is being retained until at least the beginning of 2026 to help provide some staff facilities needed to support the construction team who are building our new Surgical NICU, next to the Emergency Department.

Community Engagement Meeting December 2023

Below, you can find a link to the minutes and actions from the Community Engagement Meeting that took place on Wednesday 6th December 2023.

Community Engagement Meeting Minutes – 06/12/2023 (181kB pdf)

Springfield Park Newsletters

Our official Springfield Park newsletters can be found below!

Alder Hey Community Newsletter November 2023 (6MB pdf)

Alder Hey Community Newsletter June 2023 (1MB pdf)

Springfield Park Newsletter March 2023 (2MB pdf)

Springfield Park Newsletter December 2022 (3MB pdf)

Springfield Park Newsletter Autumn 2022 (2MB pdf)

We know that Alder Hey’s Hospital and Children’s Health Campus were only made possible thanks to our amazing community. We’re really grateful for that and we’re committed to delivering a Springfield Park that will be enjoyed by all.