Viridor’s Beddington Farmlands landfill site in Sutton, south London, is being transformed into a network of species-rich habitats as it closes its doors to active waste.
In Sutton, Viridor’s restoration team has recently held open days and invited members of the community on guided site tours to view the wet grassland habitat creation and newly-installed bird hides.
The c. 120-hectare site has supported the South London Waste Partnership and communities with safe disposal of non-recyclable waste since the late nineties. The local authority partnership (made up of Croydon, Kingston, Merton and Sutton) has now opted to divert its non-recyclable waste away from landfill. It will now use the £205m Beddington Energy Recovery Facility to transform this waste into enough electricity to power c. 55,000 homes.
Viridor is restoring the Beddington Farmlands in accordance with a detailed Restoration Management Plan, agreed with the local authority. This will see the development of a series of habitats, including wet grassland, meadowland and hedge habitats to support wildlife species including lapwing and skylark, breeding wildfowl and duck populations.
This was a great opportunity to see the work taking place to revive the Farmlands as a natural wildlife habitat
Located in a highly populated part of south London, there is enthusiastic community interest in the site and, with the recently published roadmap, Viridor has developed an innovative way of communicating progress updates with stakeholders while offering the local community the opportunity to get even closer to the site through farmlands open days.
Terry Murphy, Viridor’s Landfill Director, said: “We are committed to progressive restoration at the Beddington Farmlands, developing a diverse green space for the local community to enjoy in the coming decades. To help demonstrate the progress made to date, and the work planned in the coming months and years, Viridor has held open days and now published the Beddington Farmlands Restoration Roadmap.
“This summarises the c. 150-page technical Restoration Management Plan and Viridor’s planned timetable.”
Cllr Barry Lewis, ward member for Wallington North, attended the open day and commented: “This was a great opportunity to see the work taking place to revive the Farmlands as a natural wildlife habitat. We walked the cycleway route and it was really positive to see the progress that has been made; the wet grassland area is ready to be seeded, fences are built and hedgerows are starting to establish.
“There is still a lot of work to be done which you can see on the restoration roadmap, come along see for yourself, perhaps on the next open day or by visiting the bird hides shortly accessible from Hackbridge.”