Autumn Litter Pick & Bulb Planting, St. Peter's, Newcastle

Earlier today, twenty one St. Peter's neighbours turned out for the Autumn Litter Pick and Bulb Planting. The activity was organised by St. Peter's neighbourhood volunteers, and assisted by the loan of pickers, gloves and high-vis vests from Newcastle City Council.

The event was organised to mark the conclusion of the past three months of summer volunteer-gardening, and other types of volunteer work, in communal spaces around the St. Peter's neighbourhood.

This programme of improvements was very much only made possible by neighbours volunteering their time and skills, and by money from a Ward-aid grant awarded to St. Peter's Neighbourhood Association by Newcastle City Council specifically for this purpose.

In less than two hours today, the volunteer teams had covered and litter-picked the whole of the neighbourhood. Twenty five full sacks of litter had been collected and delivered to the tip. Volunteers then returned to base camp (aka Merchants Tavern) for tea and biscuits also organised by more volunteer neighbours.

After a short break, bulbs were planted in the recently neighbourhood volunteer-created corner site on Bottlehouse Street/Dobson Crescent. The site will soon be home to the new neighbourhood notice board organised by St. Peter's Neighbourhood Association and Newcastle City Council.

Today's litter pick by residents also complemented similar ones carried out by neighbourhood businesses British Engines and Jewson. Employees from both companies had turned out too two days before, and litter-picked the areas around their own buildings and estate.

Many neighbours have already commented that such efforts and work ensure that St. Peter's continues to be one of the smartest and friendliest neighbourhoods in Newcastle.