How London plans to ‘rewild’ the city

Until this spring, there hadn’t been any beavers living in London for 400 years. But a pair of the animals (named “Justin Beaver” and “Sigourney Beaver”) were released at a site in the northern part of the city in March, where the local council wants to help rebuild biodiversity. Nearby, over the last two years, volunteers have planted 100,000 trees on the site of an ancient woodland, aiming to capture CO2 and help reduce the risk of flooding for homes in the area. Others have been working for years to restore the Thames River, which was once declared biologically dead but now has increasing populations of animals like seals and seahorses.

A group of conservation experts is now beginning to work on a larger plan for “rewilding” across the entire city of nine million people. In key areas around the edges of the city, partners that include local government agencies will restore marshes, wetlands, and native forests. Park managers are already beginning to restore nature in city parks. “Nature corridors” next to canals and train lines will help give wildlife a path to travel from one area to another. And city officials will encourage Londoners to help rebuild biodiversity in their own gardens and on green roofs.

“The natural fabric in this country has become very, very depleted,” says Ben Goldsmith, a financier and environmentalist who pitched the idea of a city-wide rewilding project to London mayor Sadiq Khan at the global climate summit in Glasgow last year. “Even in the last 30 years, there have been unbelievable declines in some of the most basic species. The cuckoo, which heralds the English summer, is down by 90% in my lifetime. We’ve lost so much. And so inevitably, if you’re a nature lover, you end up being an environmentalist.”

A team of rewilding experts, along with parks officials and others from the government, will spend the next year and a half drawing up plans for the city. The city committed £600,000 ($748,000) to a Rewild London fund that will help restore 20 to 30 sites across London, with advice from the London Wildlife Trust. One project, for example, will create habitat for pollinators along a bike trail. Another will test using recycled building materials to support butterflies. A project called “Get inVOLEd” is reintroducing water voles to a local river, and tracking them with cameras and bioacoustic recording devices. Another will reintroduce large grazing animals at three site to help restore habitat. Several other projects are also underway.

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