Queen’s Park Spring Clean

Wildlife Area

Queen's Park Spring Clean

Queen’s Park Spring Clean

A day of local activity relating to rubbish, recycling, dog poo matters and also responsible dog ownership.

Friends of Queen’s Park Gardens and community councillors will be taking to the streets along with local residents, volunteers and street sweepers from Veolia for our very first Keep Queen’s Park Tidy day! The aim is to clean up, and encourage people to do more to keep our neighbourhood tidy and litter-free in future. Please join us, even if only for a short while at any point in the day. All ages including kids are welcome. We’re really keen to get as many people involved as possible.

The day looks like this:

10am Meet outside Beethoven Centre on Third Avenue. 10am– 1pm Street litter pick and clear-up, including Queen’s Park Gardens, with all equipment including t-shirts supplied by Veolia

1.00pm Lunch provided for all volunteers, Veolia and Westminster council staff at St Judes Hall, Ilbert Street

2pm to 3pm Mozart Estate.

We will also have a special team out talking to dog owners about cleaning up after their pets. We know dog fouling and dogs off leads is a major concern of local residents.

Please email esweeney@nullqueensparkcommunitycouncil.gov.uk for more information, or call the community council office 0208 964 8024 (or try 07831 687 602 on the day).

Spring is here

Local Community, Open Spaces, Queen's Park Gardens

The first day of Spring has passed and the park changes almost daily.

Have you noticed that a new flowering cherry tree was planted in the rose garden in the middle of winter? Its first blossoms are showing now.
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There are lovely, furry catkins in the rose garden
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and the blackbirds appreciate variety of ground cover.

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 In the wilder corner, you can just see a flowering currant coming into bloom as well.

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As you leave the rose garden, you can’t miss the cheerful yellow of the Forsythia.
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Among the bushes just outside the rose garden, the flowering cherry is in full swing.
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Elsewhere around the park are various kinds of berberis
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and even the humble daisy is pleased to see the sunshine.

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The blackthorns are brightening up the hedges around the park railings.

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and if you keep your eyes open while you’re walking around the estate, there are some treats in the gardens. This lovely camellia is in a street very near the park.

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Solar Eclipse

Wildlife Area

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Are you going to look at the partial solar eclipse in Queen’s Park Gardens or nearby?

The weather could be better than anticipated but DO TAKE CARE.

There are several ways to enjoy this event safely but

  • DON’T look directly at the sun
  • DON’T use a normal camera without a filter
  • DON’T use ordinary sunglasses

as this would result in very serious damage to eyes, young and old. Please don’t take any chances.

It’s all happening between 8:25am and 10:40am with the maximum point coming around 9:30am. The telly and papers have suggestions for ways of enjoying the eclipse.  Check out what Radio Times says here and more ideas here.  Want to make a pinhole camera, that will project the tiny crescent onto paper for you and your friends? It’s great fun and you can learn how to make one here.

This kind of event may only happen a couple more times in your lifetime so enjoy yourself and if you take a photo of your pinhole camera, or your best friend wearing the special, safety glasses, why not let us know on Facebook?  Do not take direct pictures of the eclipse unless you have the specialist equipment needed.

The End of Winter

Queen's Park Gardens, Wildlife Area

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This winter has been relatively mild and many plants are showing signs of welcoming Spring. It’s not long before our first gardening session of the year on 14th March.

The Friends of Queens Park Gardens braved the dog mess to take a few photos of the changing shrubs.

Snowdrops by the Third Avenue gate

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Hellebores in the Wildlife Area

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The oval bed in the Rose Garden

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Bulbs in the Rose Garden

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The triangular bed by the Outdoor Gym (great to see so many people using it)

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Nothing happening with the trees yet but they’re still beautiful

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Avenues Radio

Local Community

There are only a few days left in Avenue Radio’s annual broadcast slot. Have you had a chance to listen this year?

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The Avenues Youth Project is a charity that was established in 1979 to provide activities outside of school hours for young people aged 13-19 living in the North Paddington area of Westminster. In Particular, it was established in recognition of the lack of facilities targeting young Afro-Caribbean people in the area. Since that time the project has grown from strength to strength and in line with the diversity of our local community, we now attract and welcome a wide range of young people from many different communities that make up the Queen’s Park and Westminster as a whole.
Two of the activities that Young people have been interested in over the years are music and radio, our long time worker Carol Bent recognised this and took the initiative to set up a radio station called AvenuesFM.
Avenues FM has been a community based radio station for the past 20 years. Every year we are awarded a RSL for 4 weeks on the FM dial. Young people, local, regional and national organisations come in to do interviews. Just to name a few Bernardos, Panorama, WAC, Save the Children and more.
One of our highlights for our broadcast is our big debate that happens in the month of February, past panellist has been, Politician Brian Paddick, Criminologist and Filmmaker Roger Graef, chair of DWP Jasmine Batliwali and local MP Karen Buck as the chair.
In December 2014, The Avenuesfm team took the decision to change the station ID to Avenuesradio however we will continue to bring you the best of Queens Park and the surrounding communities. Keep listening to Avenuesradio.