First published: Friday, 18 September 2015
Keziah Mookram-Gray from Herne Hill Forum’s been taking part in a series of Capital Clean-up events to smarten up Herne Hill train station. She tells us more…
I joined the Herne Hill Forum in July, but the group’s been doing great things in the area for a while. On 28 August, we held the second of our Capital Clean-up events to ‘Scrub up the Square’ at Herne Hill train station. The first event on 16 July had lots of volunteers out to clean and weed old planters and tree pits and litter pick. The second event was the ‘Green-up’ part of the project.
At the second event we planted in the freshly weeded planters. We also had two new planters to use in the shape of a miniature train. It even had a presentation space to show artwork from children who joined us for the day! The children also helped to prepare pallet gardens which will hang in a nearby alley. They brought a great energy and can-do attitude to the event!
One of the best things about the day was the range of ages who took part - from young kids to people who’d lived in Herne Hill since 1944. The kids really enjoyed creating lovely plant arrangements. Everybody involved believes the improvements will encourage local pride and make the Station Square an even nicer place to be.
To make sure people knew about the event we used all the resources we could. From putting up posters around the area, to promoting the events page on social media and asking local garden centres to email customers about the event. We even used good old-fashioned word of mouth! As well all the volunteers who helped, we’d also liked to thank the businesses around the square who got involved too.
We’d like to continue by ‘greening-up’ the roads running from the square with more planters. We’ll also carry on using the Capital Clean-up kit to clear up our neighbourhood too. I’m delighted that both our Capital Clean-up events have given local people the chance to come together and make a difference in how their neighbourhood looks and feels, for the better.
Find out more about Capital Clean-up
You can read more about Herne Hill Forum on Project Dirt, their website or Twitter (@hernehillforum).
You can find your local Capital Clean-up group on our map. Events will be happening until mid-September, We’ll be featuring more great projects on this blog.
Capital Clean-up is part of the Mayor’s wider Team London volunteering programme and is supported by McDonald’s.