We sat down with our Head of Grounds Maintenance, Ross, to talk about The Elmsbrook Eco development in Bicester.
We wanted to find out more about the partnership with A2Dominion and how we’re encouraging residents to adopt more planet-friendly habits in their homes, as well as the environment around them!
Can you sum up your role in a sentence?
My role within Smarter Services is to manage the ground’s maintenance across our portfolio, which currently consists of over 260 sites covering the Southeast, Oxford and Bicester.
Elmsbrook is a huge development. Can you tell us how Smarter Services helps support its sustainability goals?
The Elmsbrook development is slightly different from our usual sites because it’s an eco-village. So with that comes unique challenges: whether that’s the equipment that we use, our green waste disposal, or keeping down our carbon footprint by sourcing all of our materials within a 10-mile radius of Bicester – that proves challenging itself.
Everything in the development is powered by solar-panelled buildings: the electricity, the hot water, so, from a grounds maintenance aspect, we have to try and continue the eco style there. Things like planting orchards and wildflowers, keeping everything locally based, switching our tools to battery-powered where possible (aiming for 70% by 2025). We’re even trying to go eco on weed killer as well at the moment!
And everything that we recycle within the development goes back on the development. So all our grass and hedge cuttings, we recycle on site. Then, when it comes to bedding, we use that compost to put back into the growing cycle of the development. All aspects are approached by asking, ‘How can we do that in a more sustainable way?’.
“We really are leaving no stone unturned when it comes to improving our sustainability efforts!”
What do you do for the community to try and encourage sustainable living?
Along with the residents, we team up with A2 Dominion, and we attend and support their community days. That can consist of things like planting; last winter, we planted over 500 tree saplings within the developments with the residents. Everyone got involved and joined us to plant oak trees, silver birch, and cherries. We also develop the area with more wildflowers to encourage bees, butterflies and bugs as well.
We’ve also just finished an orchard for the residents in a wild area so they can pick their own fruit. Our aim is to encourage them to use the open spaces, to get out of the fresh air! The other project we are doing at the moment is a sunflower competition. We’re encouraging people to get outside and plant their own sunflowers and get gardening. All these activities are open to every age group, every demographic, so it’s really about bringing residents together in a way that fosters that sense of community!
“We proudly support the Elmsbrook Gardening Society to create areas for residents to enjoy the outdoor space; creating allotments and safe playground areas for the children as well. So we do support the residents quite a lot, alongside supporting A2Dominion in trying to improve Elmsbrook itself.”
How popular have these sustainable events and projects been?
We do at least three or four events a year with the residents, and recently, within the last two months, we’ve been supporting the local school, which is situated in the development, as well as the gardening club. They have a great wild area, which is perfect for learning opportunities; we have bee hives, we’re creating bug hotels for the children to get involved and you may even spot a badger! We think it’s important for them to learn more about the environment that they live in, especially as it is an Eco-Village. We’re trying to teach them more about sustainability within the development and within the open spaces. So, hands-on activities in the fresh air are great for trying to get kids involved in what we do.
One of my favourite parts of the job is being outdoors and speaking with the residents, actually. It’s so rewarding to get such great feedback from the work we do and the environments we create. Ultimately, this is their home environment, this is their outdoor space. And we’re proud to be able to give them what they’re after! So that, to me, is one of the most rewarding parts of my job, definitely.
