Heritage Fund - Partnership Projects

The Tame Valley Wetlands (Landscape Partnership) Scheme is a large, landscape-scale scheme with local people, waterways, heritage and wildlife at its heart. You can read more about the partnership here.

Our vision:

To create a wetland landscape, rich in wildlife and accessible to all. This will be achieved by taking a landscape-scale approach to restoring, conserving and reconnecting the physical and cultural landscape of the Tame Valley. By re-engaging local communities with the landscape and its rich heritage, a sense of ownership, understanding and pride will be nurtured to ensure a lasting legacy of restoration and conservation.

Thanks to funding from the National Lottery through the National Lottery Heritage Fund (NLHF) and organisations on the Tame Valley Wetlands Landscape Partnership, the Tame Valley Wetlands Landscape Partnership Scheme (TVWLPS) was delivered between 2014 and 2018. The scheme covers an area of 104 km² (10,350 hectares to be precise!) in the Tame Valley, following the River Tame between Birmingham and Tamworth, in North Warwickshire and south-east Staffordshire.

With funding from partners and NLHF, detailed development and consultation work was carried out to fine tune the scheme. This culminated in a second round application to NLHF in December 2013, which included the production of a Landscape Conservation Action Plan – a detailed plan for the scheme and the Partnership’s ‘mandate for the landscape’.In 2014, the Partnership was awarded £1.7 million by NLHF to deliver a £2.5 million scheme (with full funding later secured).

To achieve our vision, four aims were identified, which reflect the four themes of the Heritage Lottery Fund’s Landscape Partnership funding stream, as well as the overarching aims of the Partnership.

Our four principal aims:

Conserve, enhance and restore built and natural heritage features in order to improve the fragmented and degraded landscape of the Tame Valley. Emphasis will be given to linear features such as the River Tame and its floodplain, the canal corridor and historic hedgerows.
Reconnect the local community with the Tame Valley landscape and its heritage by engaging and involving people of all ages, backgrounds and abilities with their local green spaces, sites of heritage interest and the conservation and restoration of these places. Emphasis will be given to engaging hard-to-reach groups, community-led initiatives and delivering events and activities.
Improve access and learning for local people – both physical access on and between sites and intellectual access on and off site through a range of resources. This includes development of the ‘Tame Way’, themed trails, and a Gateway to the Tame Valley interpretation centre and website.
Provide training opportunities for local people by offering taster sessions, short courses, award schemes and certificates in a range of heritage and conservation topics, in order to increase the skill and knowledge levels within the local population and provide a lasting legacy.

Key outputs

In order to meet these four aims, we set a variety of SMART objectives. Meeting these aims and objectives ensured that the scheme reached its targets and produced the following 10 key outputs:

2 historic Grade II listed structures restored.
50 hectares of wetland habitat created / enhanced.
5 Local Biodiversity Action Plan (LBAP) / endangered species protected.
1,000 metres of historic hedgerows restored or re-planted.
1,000 metres of river or canal bank re-naturalised.
3 local groups established / supported, plus a series of working groups set up.
1,000 school children, 500 members of the public and 200 young people engaged and inspired.
Promotion of the Tame Way long distance footpath and creation of 5 new circular walks, a phone app and a new interactive website.
Delivery of 150 taster days and events and activities where 1,000 people will learn about their local heritage.
65 local people formally trained, gaining accreditation through OCN and City & Guilds qualifications (plus one, two-year apprentice position).

The National Lottery Heritage Fund scheme delivered 35 projects under four programmes, all working towards the four aims / themes of the scheme.

Although each of these projects have been allocated under a particular programme, each project will have multiple outcomes, spanning across various scheme themes. We also developed a number of reserve projects for delivery if current projects became unachievable or if we secured additional funding.

The projects have been developed in close collaboration with partners and the local community.

Legacy projects are projects that have been continued after the completion of the TVWLPS National Lottery Heritage funding ended in 2018. These projects will continue to be delivered over the coming years and contribute to our Vision for the future:

“By 2030, the Tame Valley Wetlands will be a high quality, well-known and valued landscape, rich in wildlife, beauty and culture for all to enjoy.”

Between 2018 and 2030, the TVWLP will ensure a strong legacy for the HLF-funded Landscape Partnership Scheme and create a sustainable long-term future for the Partnership, working together to deliver projects categorised under four key themes:

Theme A – Delivering landscape-scale connectivity and habitat creation and management
Theme B – Maximising opportunities from strategic planning and development
Theme C – Community engagement and ownership
Theme D – Tourism: marketing and destination development

We will continue our TameForce volunteer opportunities and school education engagement programmes. We have also carried out more delivery works towards enhancing the landscape and heritage around the Tame Valley Wetlands.

Reprofiling the River Cole

The re-profiling of the River Cole, located upstream of the River Tame in North Solihull, is an important project aiming to enhance the biodiversity and aesthetics of the river. Working alongside Solihull Metropolitan Borough Council and the Environment Agency, with support from our National Lottery Heritage Fund (NLHF), the project will make the River Cole better for both wildlife and people visiting the area.

Renovating Lea Ford Cottage

Lea Ford Cottage is an ancient c17th Tudor farm worker’s cottage originally located near the small village of Lea Marston. Through around 10 generations, for almost three hundred years, the building remained virtually unchanged. The cottage was then moved to the walled garden at Hams Hall Environmental Centre.

One of TVW’s recent projects, funded through our National Lottery Heritage Fund (NLHF) Landscape Partnership, has been to restore the cottage to near its original state so that it can be used by visitors for educational purposes, such as to provide an inspiring learning space for school groups.

You can find out more about the landscape and the scheme by downloading the following (low-res) sections of the main scheme document – the Landscape Conservation Action Plan (LCAP):

If you are interested in reading the final review of the TVWLPS Evaluation Report (October 2019), please see the documents in downladable PDF form below.

TVWLPS Final Review

TVWLPS Final Review Appendices 1-2 & 4

TVWLPS Final Review Appendix 3 Case Studies

TVWLPS Final Review Executive Summary