Gardener’s notebook: the free green spaces popping up across London as part of radical ‘street-to-park’ transformations

Our streets make up 80 per cent of public space in the capital, according to Transport for London — which means a lot of concrete or tarmac.

But do roads really need so much room?

In the past few years, something quite radical has been happening.

Several boroughs have made big investments to turn stretches of pavement into some of the city’s freshest green spaces — with parks replacing parked cars and box junctions making way for box hedging. Here are some to explore.

One of the earliest street-to-park examples, this space opened to the public in 2018, with the former Aldgate gyratory replaced by grass, mature trees and a water feature. It’s hard to imagine how it was ever full of traffic.

This garden makes the most of 10 or 11 particularly jaunty plane trees, along with several new species and an understory of woodland planting.

It also contains play equipment, seating and a lawn. Cars have not been removed entirely but the planting, play area and change to the road surface mean vehicles rarely take the turn.

This officially opened in December last year and claims to be London’s largest new public space for a decade. The planting, particularly around St Mary le Strand, is beautiful. With a little bit of imagination you are transported to a bucolic English countryside scene.

Finished just a fortnight ago, this forms a “bow-tie” space of woodland planting and seating under the canopy of existing trees. It is the final part (for now) of Camden council’s West End Project, which also included Alfred Place Gardens.

These spaces are just the beginning of a changing landscape in London. They are already proving their worth and some are as busy as the capital’s most loved parks. More of this please, and not just in central London.