New approach by council to cutting grass in Harlow
News / Mon 27th Mar 2023 at 08:17am
A NEW approach to cutting green spaces in Harlow is being trialled as the grass cutting season gets underway in the town.
A grass cutting pilot project introduced last autumn has been extended to this year. The changes see improvements to the coordination of grass cutting teams with a ride on mower followed by a strimming team to improve the visual appearance of green spaces around the town.
The grass is cut by the council’s local authority trading company, HTS, who carry out environmental maintenance work in the town.
Grass will also be cut later in the winter season as global warming has seen temperatures increase which has extended the growth of grass.
Some grassed areas in the town will continue to be left long for biodiversity benefits.
Councillor Nicky Purse, cabinet portfolio holder for environment, said:
“We are working closely with HTS to improve the way we maintain the town’s green open spaces which is all part of our work to restore pride in our town.
The grass cutting pilot project worked well last year so I am pleased that this has been extended and we will keep the new working practices under review. As well as keeping our landscapes neat and tidy we know that some residents would like to see more grass left long for biodiversity.
Therefore, we are working to ensure that we have the balance of both in the right areas. Any areas left long will still need to be managed and monitored regularly.”
Kim Oconnor
2023-03-27 08:36:21
That's all very lovely, but, only way to maintain green spaces is to stop building on them, and stop chopping down our trees.
Peter
2023-03-27 09:25:54
The difference is certainly noticable already.
Kim Oconnor
2023-03-27 09:56:36
Are your plans to cut down more trees in the next 6 weeks,???? And if so ,where and how many.??
Neil Warner-Baker
2023-03-27 10:59:46
Kim, if you mean the Avenue of trees that are being cut down from the Railway roundabout to Sainsbury's on 5th avenue and along the dual carriage way opposite Sainsbury's and the High on 2nd Av...they are being cut down for Essex highways..it's all being done for hggt.HARLOW NORTH.so expect years of delays whilst they put in a additional (private taxi lane) Sustainable (sic) bus lane.
Angela Kurton
2023-03-27 11:07:58
This doesn’t seem like good news for biodiversity (and I note how that someone was careful to pop the word into this release to tick a box). For the record - I am not saying that no grass in Harlow should ever be cut. I am concerned by the stated objective of tidiness and the focus on strimming. Nature isn’t tidy. What I think we are going to see is a kind of ecocide as a strimming war is waged on hedges and verges. Leaving the occasional verge for show somewhere will not be good enough. To my mind, last year’s grass cutting *did not* work well. We lost all the previous benefits gained from the reduction in mowing and strimming during the lockdown. Grass is an almost completely sterile habitat. Verges need to be allowed to flourish so that wild flowers and plants can come through, in turn benefiting insects and birds. And also brightening the grey concrete blandness this place. The pursuit of ‘neat and tidy’ is crass at this point in the global biodiversity crisis, of which we are all a part. Strimming of verges should be the exception, not the rule. We are missing a trick in terms of halting to the relentless demise of nature here.
Andre du Preez
2023-03-27 11:57:36
Firstly, Nicky Purse is a star! In the past she's been incredibly helpful when we raised environmental issues in Harlow and the Harlow/Epping border. Secondly, welcome the new approach. Only thing I hope will disappear is the idea where one council cuts the grass (county council) and another council (local council) needs to clear the litter. In the past, this is why we've seen them cut litter on the grass into a thousand pieces because "they only cut the grass, they don't clear litter". Working with HTS this article would suggest that they now looks after the clearing of litter AND cutting the grass / hedges. If this is now the case, this is GREAT news!
Nicola Hack
2023-03-27 13:40:27
What about the quad bikes that steam round our parks, tearing up the grass? Not to mention nearly mowing people and dogs down! Police don’t want to know!
Andrew S.
2023-03-27 15:23:42
I agree with Peter, I think there has been an improvement in the appearance of the grassed areas in the town, and they appear to be cutting the grass earlier in the season. All good.
Peter Henegan
2023-03-27 21:39:32
We had a wild flower area by St Mary Latton in 2021 but last year it didnt really flourish. Will it be reseed this year? As for the comments re litter, I would much prefer litter to be cleared and leave verges
chris snow
2023-03-28 10:50:21
I would be very interested to understand what a biodiversity-led (rather than maintenance-led) approach to Harlow's green spaces would look like. Whilst functional playing fields need short grass there is a lot of landscape that need not be maintained so intensively. The key, I think, is to have a landscape that looks 'tended to' and if it is a biodiverse wilderness, that it is deliberately so and can be cleared of rubbish (and doesn't attract it) and is still maintained. It would be fascinating to know how today's equivalent of Sylvia Crowe (the original landscape designer) would approach the design and maintenance of Harlow's (lets not lose sight!) amazing green wedge landscape.
Edward Huxtable
2023-03-28 11:49:17
You know the next complaint would be how scruffy Harlow was looking. You just cannot win.
Old Harlow
2023-05-28 04:38:29
The grass in our communal garden hasn’t been cut for at least a couple of months. It has now grown 4ft. We can’t hang our washing out because it touches the grass. Quick enough asking for council tax now using excuses not to cut the grass. Unacceptable!
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