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Lancashire Wildlife Trust and National Highways announce biodiversity boost

Lancashire Wildlife Trust and National Highways have joined forces to launch a new £6 million Network for Nature programme, with three exciting projects that will improve habitats across Lancashire, Manchester and North Merseyside, benefitting people, nature and wildlife.

The projects will help create, restore and connect places for wildflowers, trees and wildlife, where the environment has been impacted by activities from previous road building. Natural solutions such as wetlands and reedbeds will help filter polluted run-off from roads.

The projects include:

  • Creating pollinator networks along the A56-M65 corridor
  • The restoration and enhancement of Red Moss a rare area of lowland raised peat bog adjacent to the M61
  • Helping to create a nature recovery network in the peatlands of Greater Manchester

Each of these are areas where the environment has been impacted by activities from previous road building.

Alan Wright, Campaigns Manager at Lancashire Wildlife Trust, said: “We are delighted to have been awarded this vital funding. We live in one of the most nature depleted countries in the world.  Our region has lost of 98 per cent of our lowland raised peat bogs, and nationally 97 per cent of our lowland meadows have disappeared, areas which once hummed with the buzz of bees, and beautiful butterflies. Wading birds like curlew and lapwing, which rely on healthy wetlands are on the red list and water voles are struggling in polluted rivers.

“The Network for Nature funding will make a real difference to our wildlife. For example, roadside verges through East Lancashire are being transformed into wildflower wonderlands, providing a haven for our vital pollinating insects. And across Greater Manchester, restoration works have already helped to re-connect our precious remaining but isolated fragments of lowland raised peat bog, allowing the wildlife that calls them home to become more resilient.”

Lancashire Wildlife Trusts’ are just three of 26 projects which form the Network for Nature programme.

Green sphagnum moss with red round-leaved sundew

Mark Hamblin

National Highways, the company responsible for England’s motorways and major A-roads, has awarded nearly £6 million from its Environment and Wellbeing designated fund into the Network for Nature programme.

Overall, 26 biodiversity projects will enhance, restore and create more than 1,700 acres (690 hectares) of woodlands, grasslands, peatlands and wetlands across every region of England, with five sitting in the North West of England.

In England, the roadside estate is vast and yet is adjacent to some of our most precious habitats. When situated alongside linear infrastructure, such as motorways, habitats can create crucial corridors for pollinating insects, birds and small mammals, enabling wildlife to move through the wider landscape. 

Alan Shepherd, National Highways’ Regional Director for the North West, said: “We’re delighted the region is sharing in this new Network for Nature fund.

“Over the last few years we’ve led the way in the North West in demonstrating how we can improve bio-diversity alongside our motorways and major A roads. 

“Our ground-breaking partnership with Cumbria Wildlife Trust and its Get Cumbria Buzzing initiative has helped breathe new life into our roadside verges – particularly in enhancing habitats for vital pollinator species.”

Since 2015 the company has invested around £25 million towards the creation, enhancement and restoration of habitats on or near the motorway and major road network. The combined group of projects within the Network for Nature programme will be one of the biggest contributors towards biodiversity improvements.

Nikki Robinson, Network for Nature Programme Manager for The Wildlife Trusts said:

“We’re very pleased that National Highways is committed to Network for Nature, with a strategic approach to restoring nature and joining up vital places for wildlife to help counter the damaging impacts of previous road building.  

“Historic road building programmes have contributed to nature’s decline, fragmenting wild spaces and causing environmental pollution, and this programme will help Wildlife Trusts throughout England carry out important nature conservation work, and contribute to a national Nature Recovery Network, connecting town and countryside, and joining up vital places for wildlife, and promoting landscape scale connectivity.”

National Highways aim to achieve no net loss to biodiversity by 2025, lead industry peers and the supply chain, and encourage and support communities to connect with wildlife and wild places where they live and work.

Currently in its third year, National Highways’ Designated Funds programme, which was allocated £936m for Roads Period 2 (2020-2025), is divided into four funding streams aimed at making the biggest difference and delivering lasting benefits; environment and wellbeing, users and communities, safety and congestion and innovation and modernisation. You can find a full list of projects in the North West below.

For more information, please visit the webpage

Further project information

Pollinator networks A56-M65

Creating a linear pollinator network on and near to the A56-M65, creating and restoring grasslands and other special places for insects to reverse the impacts of fragmentation and habitat loss caused by the road network. The project will focus on 100 hectares for pollinators including the solitary Tormentil Mining-bee, the Emperor Moth and the Green Hairstreak butterfly, and key food plants, Devil's-bit Scabious, Bilberry and Upright Tormentil.  

Nature connections on the Manchester Mosses – M62

Nature connections on the Manchester Mosses, will re-create a nature recovery network across this endangered landscape, which is bisected by the M62. The project will improve, and re-wet lowland raised bog for specialist plants, including sphagnum mosses, improve carbon storage, and offer wildlife stepping stone sites and buffer areas

Red Moss M61

Restoration and enhancement of Red Moss, a rare area of lowland raised peat bog adjacent to the M61. Re-wetting works will connect higher and drier parts of the bog with lower and wetter areas, allowing plants species such as the carnivorous sundews to colonise these new areas, and increasing the available habitat for wetland specialist wildlife.

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