New Placement: Lancashire WT

Hi all. Pasted below are details of a new placement with the Lancashire Wildlife Trust
Cheers, Mick

EMSD PROJECT PLACEMENTS: ORGANISATION INFORMATION FORM

Name of organisation: Lancashire Wildlife Trust

Web site address: www.lancswt.org.uk

Street address (location of placement):

Greater Manchester Office, 499-511 Bury Road,

Bolton, BL2 6DH

Contact person: James Hall

Position in organisation: Senior Project Officer

Telephone: 01204 663754; Email: jhall@lancswt.org.uk

Broad scope of organisation’s activities

The Lancashire Wildlife Trust is dedicated to the protection and promotion of wildlife in Lancashire, Greater Manchester and North Merseyside. We provide protection for endangered species, own and manage nature reserves, educate and inspire children, offer opportunities for people to volunteer in worthwhile conservation projects and campaign at every level of government.

Student project(s) (brief description of aims, tasks and outputs)

Lancashire Wildlife Trust has been working on a number of different Local Nature Reserves / Country Parks in Bolton over the past 20 years. At present we are reviewing priorities and one of the top priorities is a number of sites which form a green network along Bradshaw Brook in eastern Bolton. We are particularly interested in the section of the network which runs from Entwistle Reservoir (West Pennine Moors) through to Clifton Country Park (Salford) as this fits with the Wildlife Trusts Living Landscape Vision.

One of the key tasks required to produce an action plan for this green network is to undertake an investigation of the community which has access to the network. Some of the key questions include:

- How many people live within walking distance of the green network

- How many people live within driving distance of the green network

- Summary statistics for people living within walking / driving distance of the network including deprivation, education, ethnicity, etc.

Ideally this task will be undertaken using a GIS package with a professional report produced mapping the corridor and those communities within walking / driving distance identified.

Additional mapping work may include identifying the key transport features along the corridor such as train stations, bus routes and car parks so that we can examine any gaps in provision. The placement could also map existing features along the corridor such as cycle routes, orienteering trails and visitor centres.

This desk based work will be combined with a consultation exercise along the green network and within identified communities to examine whether greenspaces are important to local people and how they would like to use them. It is unlikely that the placement would be able to undertake any consultation as this would demand a significant amount of time although it may be possible for the placement to develop the questionnaire.

Outputs

Report and a presentation of report

Special requirements

Knowledge of GIS mapping