Burnley town centre celebrates Britain in Bloom success

Run by the Royal Horticultural Society, the awards are the UK’s largest horticulture campaign and celebrate the efforts of local communities in preserving and improving their local environment.

Charter Walk was awarded the It’s Your Neighbourhood Level 5 Outstanding for its Budding Burnley initiative, which saw a number of permanent community run planters placed throughout the shopping centre with all produce grown being donated to local food banks.

The centre also took home the Clean Sweep award, alongside Burnley town centre, which was awarded to the cleanest shopping centre.

Centre manager Debbie Hernon said: “We are delighted with our recent success at the Britain in Bloom awards and would like to thank everyone who had a hand in making it possible.

“Our local community is at the heart of everything we do here at Charter Walk and we take pride in the fact that we are more than just a shopping centre; we are a part of the neighbourhood.

“We plan to build upon this success and make sure that Charter Walk continues to enrich our surrounding environment.”

The duo each received a Gold Award as well, with Charter Walk taking theirs in the Best Large Commercial/Retail/ Industrial Park Category and Burnley town centre taking theirs in the Best Town Centre Category respectively.

Joanne Swift, Burnley Council’s head of streetscene, said: “This is blooming great news. A lot of work by a lot of people goes on to make Burnley town centre as attractive as possible to bring in more shoppers and all that effort is paying off.

“It’s particularly good to see that Burnley has been recognised as having the cleanest shopping centre given the hard work of staff from Charter Walk and our cleansing partner Urbaser to keep the centre as tidy and litter-free as possible.”

The Britain in Bloom awards celebrate everything from creative planting schemes and landscaping to recycling and clean-up projects.