Page 4 - City Life Magazine - Autumn Edition

4 Issue 56 • October 2021

NEWS
City enjoys brilliant

summer comeback

With shops and businesses back open, elephant sculptures on the
streets and even giant tentacles on city centre buildings, Worcester has
enjoyed a successful summer following the end of the lockdown.

With regulations lifted, the city enjoyed a big average
increase in footfall of 9.2% in July. In fact, in the week of
19-25 July that uplift hit 14.5% - one of the highest in the
entire country.

Both residents and visitors have found plenty to enjoy – and
not just the city’s fantastic range of shops, cafes, restaurants
and bars.

Families flocked to see the colourful elephant sculptures
lining the streets, thanks to the wildly popular Worcester’s Big
Parade trail, run by St Richard’s Hospice.

Tentacles also grew out of shops, a giant beanstalk sprouted
from the ground and live performers popped up in the streets
during the week-long Same But Different programme, run by
The Arches Festivals.
Councillor Lucy Hodgson, Chair of Worcester City Council’s
Many long-established events have been making a welcome Place and Economic Development Committee, said:
return over the last few weeks, including the Three Choirs “Worcester is recovering well from the lockdown and
Festival and the Worcester Festival, all adding to a happy the City Council and its partners are committed to doing
post-lockdown atmosphere that also saw giant butterfly everything they can to attract visitors and support the local
decorations and pop-up parks appearing in the city centre. economy.”

Going green to keep the city clean

Worcester City Council has bought its first set of electric
grounds maintenance equipment as part of a continuing
drive to reduce carbon emissions from its daily work to
keep the city looking beautiful.

The new electric gear includes hedge trimmers and grass
strimmers, all powered by batteries which the council
workers wear strapped to their backs. It replaces old petrol-
driven equipment that had come to the end of its life.

The electrically-powered kit enables the City Council’s
street scene team to cut the grass, tidy the hedges and
manage trees across Worcester just as effectively as the old
equipment, but with a smaller environmental impact.

Councillor Andy Stafford, Chair of the City Council’s
Environment Committee, says: “It does the job really well The street scene team in action with electric grounds maintenance kit
(left to right: Chris Davis, Peter Wright, Alex Grochotov, Jacob Newman)
and reduces the amount of CO² emissions as we carry out
our work keeping Worcester clean and tidy. Introducing the new electrical grounds maintenance
equipment is in line with the City Council’s environmental
“It’s also better for staff because it vibrates less, and is sustainability action plan, which sets out steps for
much quieter, which is good news for residents.” Worcester to become carbon neutral by 2030.

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