Every Kirklees household is to be within 500 metres of ‘high quality greenspace’ by 2050, the council has said, as an initiative encompassing regions across Yorkshire takes its next steps.
The White Rose Forest (WRF) is the community forest for North and West Yorkshire. The WRF partnership was established back in 2000 and is made up of 11 organisations across the two regions, in which Kirklees Council is playing a leading role as the ‘Accountable Body’.
The WRF is not a single ‘forest’, but the network of all trees, woods and forests across North and West Yorkshire, including trees in gardens and on residential streets, in town and city centres, along transport routes, in parks and green spaces, by rivers, canals and lakes, on farmland and in the countryside.
Over the last 18 months, the White Rose Forest team consulted a wide range of stakeholders to help put a strategic plan together which will provide the framework to increase tree and woodland cover and management across North and West Yorkshire over the next 25 years.
Image: White Rose Forest
Kirklees Council recently agreed to adopt this plan which sets out five objectives to: increase tree canopy cover in line with government statutory targets; protect and restore more trees and woodlands; engage more people, communities and businesses in the planting, management and contact with trees and woodlands; promote the transformational benefit of trees and woodlands; and grow the impact and sustainability of the White Rose Forest.
The local authority has said that every single Kirklees household will be within 500 metres of high-quality greenspace by 2050.
Cllr Graham Turner, Cabinet Member for Finance and Regeneration commented: “Together with the rest of the White Rose Forest partnership, we have already achieved so much. During 2023-24 alone 794,000 trees were planted in the White Rose Forest across 175 different projects.
“By 2050, we want everyone in Kirklees to be closer to high-quality greenspace and the latest plan from the White Rose Forest, named Community Forest of Year in 2024, will help us get there.
“As well as creating more spaces for nature and for people, trees and woodland are one of the most effective nature-based solutions for adapting to climate change. They are a potent carbon capture tool and a vital part of our mission to be Net Zero by 2038.”
