Final Report to Defra Improving the River Lea in Luton for the local economy, society and environment

Payments for ecosystems services (PES) – PES pilot research projects (2012-13): Project code: ERG 1205

March 2014

Creation / Revision History

Issue / Revision Final Report Date 28/3/14 Prepared by: Tim Brewer 28/3/14 Reviewed by Jenny Mant 14/2/14, Paul Burgess 31/3/14 Reviewed by Steering Group February 2014 Reviewed by Defra February 2014

Cranfield University Cranfield Bedfordshire Mk43 0AL Tel: 01234 750111

Suggested publication reference:

Brewer, T.R., Mant, J., Harris, J. Gill, A., Shaw, H., Burgess P.J., Farewell, T. (2014). Improving the River Lea in Luton for the local economy, society and environment. Final Report to Defra. Cranfield University March 2014. 51 pp.

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Contents

Executive Summary ...... 1 1. Introduction ...... 7 1.1 Overview ...... 7 1.1.1 Ecosystems services ...... 7 1.1.2 Payment for Ecosystem Services ...... 7 1.2 Aims...... 8 1.3 Methodology ...... 9 1.3.1 Scoping study ...... 9 1.3.2 Workshops ...... 9 1.3.3 Information sharing and dissemination ...... 11 1.4 Layout of the report ...... 11 2. Study area ...... 12 2.1 Urban development legacy ...... 12 2.2 Characterisation of River Lea ...... 13 2.3 Current ecosystem services ...... 15 2.3.1 Water quality ...... 15 2.3.2 Flood regulation ...... 17 2.3.3 Climate regulation ...... 17 2.3.4 Habitats for wildlife ...... 18 2.3.5 Recreation ...... 18 2.3.6 Landscape, visual amenity and health ...... 18 2.4 Summary ...... 19 3. Proposed framework for urban PES schemes ...... 23 3.1 Introduction ...... 23 3.2 A framework for PES development in urban settings ...... 23 3.2.1 Initial stages ...... 23 3.2.2 Selection of PES schemes to take forward ...... 26 3.2.3 Awareness raising ...... 27 3.3 Summary ...... 27

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4 Proposed PES schemes for river improvement in Luton ...... 35 4.1 Misconnections ...... 35 4.1.1 The ‘Eco-plumber’ concept ...... 36 4.1.2 Key PES characteristics of the scheme ...... 37 4.1.3 Taking the scheme forward ...... 38 4.2 Leagrave Park ...... 39 4.2.1 Introduction ...... 39 4.2.2 Key PES characteristics of the scheme ...... 41 4.2.3 Next steps ...... 43 5. Conclusions and lessons learnt ...... 44 5.1 Conclusions ...... 44 5.1.1 Achieving the objectives of the study ...... 44 5.1.2 Research outcomes ...... 45 5.2 Lessons learnt ...... 45 5.2.1 Development of the vision ...... 45 5.2.2 Formulating projects in PES terms ...... 46 5.2.3 Working within the constraints of funding availability ...... 47 5.2.4 Importance of stakeholder participation ...... 47 References ...... 49 Annex ...... 51 Annex A: List of organisations represented at the project workshops ...... 51

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Executive Summary

Overview This report has been prepared by Cranfield University on behalf of Defra and summarises the outcomes of the pilot Payment for Ecosystems Services (PES) project based on the River Lea in Luton. The aim of the study was to develop tools, methods and protocols for designing and implementing a PES scheme in a complex urban setting using the River Lea from its source to Luton Hoo on the south eastern outskirts of Luton. Luton is representative of many large towns in the UK having a legacy of industrial development that has subsequently declined, combined with large areas of resident development particularly in the post World War 2 period. The population of the town in 2011 was estimated at 205,300 (LBC, 2012). The town is centred on the River Lea although it is culverted through the town centre. The official source of the river is in Leagrave Park on the north western edge of the town but a brook flows into the park from Houghton Regis in the west. In these upper reaches, the river is a chalk stream and is subject to low or non-existent flow during the summer months. From Leagrave Park to the town centre the river primarily flows through parkland surrounded by residential development. To the south of the town centre to Luton Hoo, there is limited public access to the river as most of its course passes through private property. The heavily modified river has been classified as having ‘poor status’ under the Water Framework Directive guidelines. The contributing factors to this status include: misconnections from domestic plumbing systems, runoff from transport routes, stagnant water during dry periods, in-channel litter and rubbish accumulation and, legacy contamination from mobilised sediments. The PES pilot has focussed on the process of developing potential PES schemes that could enhance the ecosystem service provision of the river with particular regard to water quality, landscape, habitats and recreation.

Achievements of the pilot The following are the main achievements:

• Bringing stakeholders together to identify opportunities for enhancing the ecosystem services of the River Lea. Although individuals had worked together previously, the PES project brought together a wider range of stakeholders providing a more holistic perspective on what could be done to enhance ecosystem service provision along the River Lea. This collaborative group now participate in the River Lea Catchment Partnership meetings to take the project ideas generated in this work forward to implementation.

• Developing an overarching vision to provide the framework within which individual PES schemes can be formulated and implemented. This was not explicitly stated as an original aim but it became apparent through the first workshop that as a per-requisite to PES scheme development a vision was required around which the proposed framework for PES project selection and implemetnation could take place.

• Establishing a methodology for PES scheme development that can be applied in other urban settings. The development of tools as specified in the original aim was not achieved because the outcomes from the workshops did not lead in this direction but rather focussed on

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establishing the framework within which project proposals could be assessed and prioritised for implementation.

• Identifying potential PES schemes to develop into project proposals that contribute to the vision for the River Lea. In the context of economic constraints faced by local authorities, it was clear that the development of a menu of initiatives, which can be addressed as resources allow would be more achievable than a single large scheme.

• Identifying many potential benefits that could accrue from the implementation of PES projects along the River Lea. However, the detailed quantification of these benefits was not undertaken. Valuation methods (POSTNOTE, 2011) for non-directly traded services are often time consuming and require sufficient data on which to base the valuations. This data was not available at the local scale and within an urban context, and therefore cost benefit was assessed using expert judgement from project team members.

Method for designing a PES scheme leading to its implementation In this project, it was recognised that the active participation of stakeholders in the design and implementation of PES schemes derived from the project was a pre-requisite, particularly within the urban context where the number of stakeholders is potentially very large. A participatory approach was therefore used to bring stakeholders together from the outset of the pilot. Workshops were used to facilitate stakeholder engagement which proved to be productive. Active participation was achieved in the workshops through the use of small group exercises and reporting back in plenary sessions. In this way many perspectives were covered in a short space of time.

A key outcome of the workshop in the first month of the project was the recognition that an overarching vision was required to provide a framework within which individual incremental PES projects could be formulated. It was also recognised that this would either need to align to existing planning policy or be in a position to influence future planning policy. In the case of the pilot, the 2011 – 2031 Luton Local Plan was under consultation and this provided the opportunity for the heads of planning to review the consultation document and suggest amendments and revisions to incorporate the essence of the vision developed in the stakeholder workshops. On reflection, involvement of local authority heads of planning earlier in the framework development would have ensured that the vision was aligned with planning policy from the outset and in turn, provided a stronger steer to project selection that would result in demonstrable outcomes that align with planning policy. In fact, the vision did align with planning policy but it was recognised that it needed to be backed up with initiatives that had measurable rather than just aspirational outcomes. This type of alignment is another pre-requisite for successful PES scheme implementation within the urban context.

Once a vision was developed, it was possible to select PES projects that could contribute to the vision. The stakeholder workshops produced a list of potential projects that could be expressed in terms of PES schemes. A SWOT (strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, threats) analysis was undertaken to help prioritise projects. This was combined with a stakeholder questionnaire that asked recipients to rank the environmental, economic and social impacts of each project and to estimate the cost of implementation. The data collected from the questionnaire survey was used to

2 Cranfield University produce a cost/impact graph that helped to inform project prioritisation.

In addition to the development of a vision and identification of potential PES projects, presentations were invited from practitioners working on similar projects and an advisor working with sustainable urban drainage schemes (SUDs). These presentations were valuable to the process as they provided new perspectives on the types of activities being considered for the River Lea pilot and therefore helped to inform project formulation.

Example PES projects for implementation Two examples of PES schemes are presented to illustrate the types of project that could be implemented to contribute to the achievement of the vision:

• Eco-plumber. Water UK (2013) estimates that about 300,000 homes in the UK discharge wastewater into local rivers rather than into the foul water sewer. Most of this wastewater arises from sinks, baths and washing machines, and toilets. Evidence of this was seen in a walkover survey of the River Lea where evidence of increased phosphorus loading and water discolouration were found.

The proposed PES scheme would see Thames Water as the beneficiary paying local plumbers acting on behalf of local residents, who are the ecosystem service providers, in a ‘one buyer; many sellers’ relationship. The benefits to Thames Water would be lower waste water treatment costs as water quality improvements arise following rectification of the misconnections. As water quality improves, other buyers and sellers of ecosystems services may ‘piggy back’ on the initial scheme to gain a wider range of ecosystem service benefits for habitats, for example.

There are roles for intermediaries, notably Luton Borough Council as the major land owner and as facilitator for bringing a range of organisations together to achieve the objectives of the scheme. An organisation called Groundwork would also have a role in education and training particularly with regard to the ‘piggy back’ ecosystem service provision.

• Leagrave Park. Leagrave Park occupies about 24 ha of the former Leagrave Marsh Farm agricultural holding and contains the official source of the River Lea. It was created in 1935 from the original marshland and adjacent grazed and arable farmland. A substantial area of the marsh was reclaimed in the mid-1950s leaving the smaller Leagrave Marsh that can still be seen today. The park contains a scheduled monument, important wetland, woodland and grassland habitats, buildings for community use and a range of recreational facilities, for example, sports pitches and a BMX track. The park is distinctive in that it potentially provides a number of ecosystem services for multiple users of those services. A detailed management plan for the park was developed by Groundwork and Luton Borough Council (2009) but the funds have not been available for its full implementation.

The ecosystem services of the proposed PES scheme would form a ‘layered’ approach comprising a bundle of services from the same land. This could be a ‘many buyers; one seller’ PES. In this case, the parks and recreation department of Luton Borough Council is

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the principal supplier of the ecosystem service. The beneficiaries of the services include the residents of the surrounding area of Limbury, Sundon Park, and Marsh Farm. Groups with an interest in supporting these communities may help support the delivery of ecosystem services by providing volunteers, funding, or applying for grants. An example of this mechanism is the construction of a boardwalk through the wet woodland area, enhancing recreation ecosystem services, where the Department for Work and Pensions and Luton Airport are part funding the unemployment training initiative that will deliver the boardwalk.

In the early stages of taking the Leagrave Park project forward, the role of the intermediary, in particular Groundwork, has been very important, identifying potential funders of projects. However, in the future it may be that other non-governmental organisations such as the local Wildlife Trust could take on the management of the Leagrave Marsh and grassland areas therefore fulfilling an intermediary role.

Beneficiaries and buyers A key beneficiary of many of the habitat, recreation and landscape based projects considered in this pilot will be Luton Borough Council as they are the land owner, and therefore ecosystem service provider, for much of the open space areas to the north of the town centre. As a public body, the ecosystem service benefits arising from the PES projects implemented will be shared by the residents and visitors to Luton. In some instances they will be the buyer of services, but they can be a seller of services purchased by others for example, Natural England and Biffa, as in the Leagrave Park case study.

In the misconnection case study, Thames Water will benefit through lower water treatment costs. However it is difficult to quantify the potential benefits as the extent of misconnections is not known at this stage. The proposed eco-plumber scheme would see Thames Water as the buyer of the services of the plumber, to obtain the expected benefits that would arise from misconnection resolution.

Deculverting of the river through parts of the town centre is under consideration. This will require significant expenditure but it is not clear at this early stage who would be the buyers for this scheme. It is proposed that the urban landscape will be improved in deculverted sections, adding land value to neighbouring properties and providing an improved business environment.

Lessons learnt Individual PES projects were not implemented in this initial stage. However, a number of learning points emerged from the process of developing the method for designing urban PES schemes:

• Development of the vision. The complexity of urban environments and the interactions between many ecosystem services requires a holistic perspective to help maximise the benefits from individual schemes. The underlying nature of a vision is that it should be ambitious and challenging. It should not be constrained by current resourcing issues but should focus on the desired outcome for ecosystem service provision. However, the vision has also to be stated in terms where deliverable actions can be easily attributed, in order to

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match the requirements of planning policy.

• Formulating projects in PES terms. Although the basic concept of PES is straightforward i.e. buyers purchase ecosystem services from sellers to provide additionality of ecosystem service provision, the formulation of projects in PES terms proved to be less straightforward for workshop participants. Individual project ideas were initially described in non PES terms as this was the ‘language’ that stakeholders were familiar with. The questionnaire was used to identify who the respondents considered to be the buyers and sellers for each project therefore providing a wide range of views from which a consensus could be derived which in turn provided the starting point for formulating each project in PES terms.

In reviewing the degree to which stakeholders in the workshops were able to align their thinking to the PES concept, two issues become apparent. The concept of ecosystem services was unfamiliar to some and secondly, the concept of buyers and sellers of ecosystem services was unfamiliar to most stakeholders. Although both concepts were explained in the workshops, they require a different way of thinking about the environment.

• Working within the constraints of funding availability. In the current financial climate, funding options within local authorities are limited. Access to S106 payments or a Community Infrastructure Levy will be very limited in Luton due to other calls on these resources. An application for Higher Level Stewardship (which may be possible for a non- urban area) has been successful, potentially providing funding for habitat and landscape enhancement. In the current economic climate, formulating projects that deliver multiple ecosystem services benefits and demonstrate a coordinated approach will be more attractive to potential funders. Alternative funding mechanisms and alternative buyers were discussed in the workshops but within the time frame available to the pilot project it was not possible to link these to specific projects.

• Importance of stakeholder participation. All of the outputs from the project have been derived from stakeholder participation in workshops. Without their involvement the objectives of the project would not have been met.

Research outcomes The project has produced outcomes that are applicable at different scales and in other urban areas:

 Locally: the vision statement has been developed and presented to the heads of planning in Luton Borough Council. As a result, the opportunity was provided to incorporate elements of the vision into the Local Plan. This approach is relevant to all local authorities as they have planning authority for developments.

 Regionally: implementation of the eco-plumber concept to rectify misconnections could have regional importance for the Lea catchment in terms of reduced water treatment costs and improved water quality benefitting habitats, landscape and amenity. Many tributaries of the Lea also have significant urban areas within their catchments and the successful implementation of a misconnection rectification scheme in these areas would enhance the

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regional benefits.

 Nationally: the team have taken part in the workshop organised by the Ecosystems Knowledge Network where the lessons learnt were shared with other pilot PES projects. The involvement of the Environment Agency as one of the stakeholders in the project provides the opportunity for dissemination of the results of this work to other Environment Agency regions.

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1. Introduction

1.1 Overview This report summarises the outcomes of the Defra funded Payment for Ecosystems Services (PES) pilot in Luton. The main purpose of the project has been to develop and test a framework for designing and implementing PES type projects within a complex urban setting. The River Lea that flows through the town of Luton and the surrounding catchment has provided the focus for this project.

1.1.1 Ecosystems services Ecosystems are a natural unit of living things (animals, plants and micro-organisms) and their physical environment. They come in different forms: marine and terrestrial, inland and coastal, rural and urban. They can also vary in scale from global to the local level (DEFRA, 2010). These ecological systems comprise mutually dependent organisms hence the deterioration of one group of organisms can be injurious to others. Organisms interact with non-living elements of the environment and are therefore affected by physical modifications to rivers and their catchments, such as the River Lea. Humans are a key component of, arguably, all ecosystems, and our impact can have major effects on other organisms; likewise a decline in some organisms and habitats can affect human well-being.

Ecosystem services are services provided by the natural environment that benefit people (DEFRA, 2010). Fisher et al. (2009) also defined ecosystem services as “the benefits people obtain from ecosystems’’ emphasising the human focus on the approach. Ecosystem services include provisioning services such as food, fibre, and bioenergy, cultural services such as the opportunity for recreation and visual amenity, regulating services such as the moderation of climate, purification of air and water, flood protection, and supporting services such as soil formation and nutrient cycling.

The approach taken by the Millennium Ecosystem Assessment (2005) is that ecosystem services are considered in terms of their effect on human well-being. The assessment indicates that human well- being is dependent on: basic materials for a good life, freedom of choice and action, health, good social relations, and security. Hence improvements in ecosystem services that deliver such effects are likely to improve human well-being. The ecosystem services provided by the River Lea through Luton are described in Chapter 2.

1.1.2 Payment for Ecosystem Services PES is a recent incentive-based method of natural resource management in which beneficiaries of ecosystem services compensate the stewards of the ecosystems that provide those services. The originality of PES comes from the focal point of the ‘beneficiary-pays principle’, as against the ‘polluter-pays principle’ (URS 2013).

Wunder (2005) provides a widely-cited definition of PES as a “voluntary transaction where a well- defined ecosystem service (or a land-use likely to secure that service), is being ‘bought’ by a (minimum one) ecosystem service buyer; from a (minimum one) ecosystem service provider, and only if the ecosystem service provider secures ecosystem service provision (conditionality)”. In addition, a PES should provide additionality, that is, payments should only be made for actions that are additional to those usually expected of landholders for actions society considers to be over and above their responsibility, rather than those required to meet legal requirements. Also, PES schemes

7 Cranfield University should be carefully designed so as not undermine existing stewardship on the part of land or resource managers.

In view of this, it is helpful to establish the baseline condition of ecosystem services, that is, the current status in the absence of a PES scheme, so that future monitoring can identify the amount of additionality achieved by the PES scheme, giving confidence to buyers that the provision of services has been improved.

In designing PES schemes within an urban context, it is important to recognise that there are potentially many stakeholders with an interest in the outcomes of a PES scheme. Therefore consultation should form an important part of the development process of a PES scheme.

There are three broad types of PES scheme (URS 2013):

 Public payment schemes through which the government pays land or resource managers to enhance ecosystem services on behalf of the wider public.  Private payment schemes which are self-organised private deals in which beneficiaries of ecosystem services contract directly with service providers.  Public-private payment schemes that draw on both government and private funds to land or resource managers for the delivery of ecosystem services.

PES schemes can operate at a range of scales: international, national, catchment or local. In this study, the project area is based in the upper part of a much larger river catchment and therefore falls between catchment and local scales.

1.2 Aims The overall aim for this study was to develop tools, methods and protocols for designing and implementing a PES scheme in a complex urban setting using the River Lea from its source to Luton Hoo on the south eastern outskirts of Luton as a case study area (Figure 1). The urban headwaters of the River Lea were chosen as its quality and quantity is severely compromised by a wide range of pressures, denying services, including future resilience to a wide stakeholder constituency, within and beyond Luton. It was anticipated that the project would help to address the strategic objectives of Luton Borough Council and the Environment Agency in the region, who are expected to become custodians of PES schemes evolving from this project.

The specific objectives of the study were:

1. To provide facilitated meetings to engage a wide range of stakeholders. 2. To identify potential actions that would restore natural capital stocks by addressing the multiple stressors in the sub-catchment. 3. To determine methods to quantify the benefits accruing, identify institutional barriers, beneficiaries and potential funders of such activities. 4. To provide a data resource and forum for collective management of natural capital and ecosystem services available to all stakeholders. 5. To develop with all stakeholders an outline PES for Luton. 6. To set out an initial framework/toolkit for designing payment for multiple ecosystem service

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projects in complex urban areas.

The project was led by Cranfield University working closely with Luton Borough Council (LBC) and the regional office of the Environment Agency (EA) as project partners. During the course of the project many other stakeholders were involved and through these it is hoped that the longevity of the work beyond the term of this pilot project can be ensured, creating a sense of project ownership amongst the beneficiaries of this historically neglected section of the River Lea.

1.3 Methodology

1.3.1 Scoping study Prior to the PES pilot project, LBC, the EA, Cranfield University and the River Restoration Centre collaborated in a small scale scoping study to characterise the state of the River Lea in Luton. The results from this study formed the foundation for the pilot study by providing an historical view of land use change within the headwater catchment over the past 100 years and a current visual assessment of condition based upon a walkover survey. The outcomes from the scoping study also informed the definition of the extent of the study area in the PES project.

1.3.2 Workshops The main activity of the pilot project was a series of workshops to bring together stakeholders to inform the development of a PES framework for the River Lea. The first workshop was held in the first month of the pilot project (21 January 2013), bringing together a range of stakeholders from Luton and the neighbouring region (the list of organisations represented at this and subsequent workshops can be found in Annex A).

The objectives of the first workshop were as follows:

• To identify strategic priorities and objectives for a river-focused PES in Luton.

• To identify institutional barriers to co-operation and implementation.

In practice, it was only possible to explicitly deal with the first objective in workshop 1 due to the amount of discussion that this objective elicited. Therefore, outline comments were made with respect to the second objective but not in a sufficiently structured way to inform the PES framework development. The second objective was therefore addressed in workshop 2. In workshop 1, the project team provided an introduction to the concept of ecosystem services and PES which was new to several of the participants. Participants engaged in a series of exercises working in small groups to identify the following:

• Identifying the stakeholders of the river – who could benefit?

• Identifying the current positives and negatives of the river – what is it like now?

• What do we want from the river? What is its potential?

• SWOT analysis – what are the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats to us achieving this potential?

Each working group contained stakeholders from different sectors to ensure that a multi-sector view

9 Cranfield University was obtained. All participants engaged fully with these activities.

The results from workshop 1 were integrated with the findings from the scoping study to develop an overarching vision for the enhancement of the River Lea supported by potential interventions and delivery mechanisms. This was presented back to the stakeholders at a second workshop in the third month of the pilot project (18 March 2013).

The objectives of the second workshop were:

• To develop a vision for the river.

• To identify issues to be addressed and mitigation options.

• To identify institutional barriers and mechanisms for overcoming these if they exist.

• To identify funding stream options.

• To identify ways forward to develop the PES framework.

A similar structure was used for workshop 2 as had been used in the first workshop i.e. introduction of the draft vision and the issues to be addressed followed by small group exercises to address the objectives.

There was wider stakeholder representation at the second workshop. In particular, a representative from Vauxhall Motors gave a business community perspective. Their involvement led to an additional meeting of the stakeholders held in the fifth month of the project at the Vauxhall Motors UK site. This provided the opportunity to visit the River Lea as it passes through the Vauxhall site and to discuss the key issues related to this section of the river. The opportunity was also taken to include the following presentations:

 The potential of Sustainable Urban Drainage Systems (SUDS) presented by Bob Bray from Robert Bray Associates.  Urban River Survey results of the length of the River Lea from its source to its confluence with the River Thames.  Project proposal from the University of Bedfordshire on “The River Lea – Archive Alive, Poetry and Photography”.

A final workshop was held in month nine of the project. The objectives were:

• To update stakeholders on progress.

• To present and agree on the final version of vision statement.

• To learn about the Trent Urban Land and Water Improvement Project (TULIP) by members of the TULIP project team.

• To define and prioritise actions to take forward.

• To review the process followed in this project.

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It was envisaged at the outset of the project that stakeholder engagement would be essential to the success of taking PES initiatives forward and this was why the project was structured around the workshops. It is the stakeholders that will need to take forward the PES initiatives and therefore their willingness to ‘buy-in’ to the project process was important.

1.3.3 Information sharing and dissemination Knowledge sharing and dissemination activities have included:

 ‘The River Lea in Luton’ blog site (http://riverlealuton.wordpress.com/) was established early in the project and provided the mechanism of publicising the outputs to project participants and anyone else with a web connection interested in the River Lea.  Attending and presenting at the Ecosystems Services Knowledge Network (EKN) held in Manchester in November 2013.  Meeting the Head of Planning and senior colleagues at LBC to discuss the incorporation of the project vision into the Local Plan.  Discussions and knowledge exchange with Thames Rivers Trust on challenges faced implementing PES schemes in complex urban environments.

1.4 Layout of the report After this initial section, Chapter 2 provides an overview of the study area, highlighting the legacy issues that will be common to many urban catchments and the ecosystem services currently provided by the river. Chapter 3 sets out a proposed framework for urban based PES schemes that could be adapted for other urban areas. Chapter 4 provides descriptions of selected PES schemes that together will begin to achieve the vision set out in Chapter 3. Chapter 5 summarises the outcomes of the study and assesses the lessons learnt. Supporting materials are provided in the Annex.

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2. Study area This chapter describes the past and present environment within the headwaters of the River Lea catchment as this provides a context against which to assess the current ecosystem service provision. The characterisation of ecosystem service provision is important, to identify what PES initiatives might be relevant and of benefit to the physical and human environments around the River Lea. Data was collated from published sources, aerial photography and field work.

2.1 Urban development legacy Luton developed around the river as a market town. During the 17th century, the straw hat making industry began to develop alongside craftsmen enterprises such as bakers, butchers, brewers, and blacksmiths that would be expected in an agricultural market town. In the 19th century Luton grew rapidly, concentrated around the hat making industry. The railway helped to spur on industrial development in the middle of the 19th century. This was succeeded in the early 20th century by new automotive, engineering and chemical industries. Continued urbanisation and industrialisation have, as commonly observed in other industrial towns, obliterated many of the natural features and environmental services upon which the settlement was founded. However, today many of the manufacturing sites have closed changing the basis of socio-economic activity in the town. The population of the town in 2011 was estimated at 205,300 (LBC, 2012).

During the scoping study, publicly available data sources were accessed to develop a database of map-based products that illustrate the changing pattern of industry through time within the catchment. Many industries leave a legacy of contamination. This is particularly relevant for sediment-related contaminants as the processes which control soil disturbance and transfer to the river system are intermittent. Once in the river system, sediment and its associated contaminants can be stored for long periods in the natural deposition areas of the river, and associated lakes and reservoirs along its course. Where flooding occurs sediment can be moved from the river system onto flooded areas (either floodplains or infrastructure and housing); it may remain there for long periods, It may eventually be removed in clean-up operations and transferred to locations outside of their river catchment of origin (sometimes even to contaminated waste sites).

Historical controls on pollution from industry or disposal of wastes would not have been as comprehensive as they are today. The highest risk industries identified through this analysis were:

 Explosives works  Gas works  Dye works  Timber yards and sawmills  Vehicle manufacturing  Metal works  Printing/pulp and paper industries

The bulk of the industrial activity took place downstream of Wardown and hence is likely to have affected the sediment that has collected in the lakes at Luton Hoo.

Many of these observations will be applicable in other industrial towns. It can often be difficult to identify the type of industrial activity at particular sites and therefore the nature and scale of impact

12 Cranfield University of potential legacy issues. Also, it is not known where contaminants in the catchment may have travelled to and their residence time between contamination and flushing. The urban legacy is therefore very complex with many unknowns.

Culverting within urban areas is commonplace. By constraining rivers in concrete channels with no buffers, there is less opportunity for natural processes to work and for the most part contaminated fine sediment will remain at the bottom of these systems giving rise to a combination of water quality and sediment quality issues. The urban legacy is therefore multi-spatial and multi-temporal.

2.2 Characterisation of River Lea The source of the River Lea, as shown on Ordnance Survey mapping, originates in Leagrave Park in the north west of the Luton urban area (Figure 1). However, physical channels are also found above this location originating in Houghton Regis (Figure 3), a typical characteristic of chalk streams where sections only have flows in the wetter winter months. A tributary channel is also indicated, feeding into the main channel a short distance downstream from Leagrave Park. The river flows generally towards the east and south east, exiting the case study area below Luton Hoo lakes on the south east edge of Luton.

Figure 1: Upper Lea catchment, Luton

In its natural state, the upper reaches of the River Lea is a chalk stream. At this stage, the river has an intermittent flow determined by the pattern and quantity of rainfall in the upper catchment and local rates of abstraction. The soils developed on the underlying chalk are freely drained and have a high leaching potential although soils in the south east portion of the catchment are less permeable

13 Cranfield University with a lower leaching potential. Urban development within the catchment through time has altered the river’s hydrology, as much of the area around it is now sealed, changing the catchment runoff characteristics.

The M1 motorway intersects the catchment to the west of the town and provides runoff into the River Lea. Other major transport routes are found within the catchment area serving both through and local traffic that also add to runoff quantities.

Several sections of the river channel have been altered as development has taken place, most notably in the town centre. Here much of the river has been culverted. Upstream of the town centre, the channel has been altered to direct the flow through the lakes in Wardown Park and either side of the A6 as it approaches the town centre (Figure 3).

Water quality monitoring data, obtained from the Environment Agency for the period 1977 to 2003, shows that there are three Environment Agency water quality monitoring sites within the case study area: Leagrave, Cat Brook and above Luton Hoo lakes. Monitoring has also been concentrated just outside of the case study area above and below East Hyde Sewage Treatment Works. In total, 60 determinands have been measured at various additional sites in and around Luton, but monitoring has been infrequent or is historic. The determinands with frequent measurements at two or more of the monitoring locations are: alkalinity to pH 4_5 as CaCO3, aluminium, ammonia un-ionised as N, ammoniacal nitrogen as N, Biological Oxygen Demand determined using allylthiourea (ATU):, chloride, orthophosphate reactive as P, oxygen dissolved as O2, oxygen dissolved % saturation, pH,

Silica reactive as SiO2, sulphate as SO4, and the temperature of water.

All rivers in the upper Lea catchment (Lea, Mimram, Beane, Rib, Ash, Stort) are classified as being in ‘moderate’, ‘poor’ or ‘bad’ condition under Water Framework Directive targets, with a few headwater stream exceptions. The Lea itself is classified as ‘poor’ in the case study area.

Some sediment quality data were available for Wardown Lake from the Environment Agency. A sediment accumulation rate of 350-400 m3 per year was estimated for the stilling basin at Wardown Lake in 2003 (Luton Borough Council cited in Pitts, 2003).

Table 1 shows the mix of land use types within the catchment according to the Land Cover map 2007 classification (Morton et al, 2011). Approximately 54% of the catchment and 48% of the area within 100 m of the River Lea is occupied by the built environment (buildings, transport routes and gardens).

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Table 1: Land use within the study area catchment

Land use Area within Area within 100m catchment (ha) of River Lea (ha)* Agriculture – arable 1748 46 Agriculture – grassland 1178 69 Woodland 307 24 Water 24 18 Scrub 32 2 Suburban 2967 138 Urban 586 7 Urban industrial 259 5 Other 9 Source: Land Cover Map 2007, Centre for Ecology and Hydrology * Excludes the culverted section in the centre of Luton

2.3 Current ecosystem services

2.3.1 Water quality Water quality can encompass two ecosystem services: a ‘fresh water’ provisioning service related to abstraction and ‘physico-chemical purification’ as a regulatory service that addresses waste assimilation. Water quantity varies significantly along the course of the river (Figure 2), reflecting the characteristics exhibited by chalk streams according to the antecedent rainfall conditions. The upper reaches of the river within the study area commonly dry out during the summer months with permanent flow normally present in most years where the river turns to flow south north of the town centre. This is recognised in the Environment Agency Licencing Strategy 2013 (EA, 2013) where no new surface water consumptive licenses from the Upper Lea source to Luton Hoo will be granted. The variable flow conditions affect water quality as flushing of the channel is not as frequent in the upper sections. Water can stagnate adversely affecting Cladophora within the channel. Fly tipping and litter accumulation also contributes to water quality issues. Luton Borough Council and the Environment Agency are keen to see water quality issues addressed and one or more PES schemes might enable an improvement in water quality to be obtained.

Figure 2:a). Litter and detritus accumulation. b). Evidence of ‘grey water’ discharge. c). Cladophora indicating increased phosphorus loading

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Runoff from M1 flows into the brook Brook used as a recreational resource

Silted lake at Wardown Park Photographs taken in July 2012

Small recreational park Houghton Brook source to the south of the fed by storm drain runoff town centre

Silted Luton Hoo lakes

Brook flows through River culverted under town centre agricultural land

Figure 3: River Lea characteristics

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2.3.2 Flood regulation Although the study area is located in the upper catchment of the River Lea and the contributing catchment area for the river is relatively small (71 km2), the floodplain of the river provides a flood regulation service. Flooding is most prevalent in the section to the north of the culverts under the town centre following either prolonged heavy rainfall or high intensity storms. The majority of this section of the river upstream to Limbury is identified as Flood Zone 3 according to the Environment Agency classification. Floodwaters are concentrated around the lake in Wardown Park and can affect the adjacent New Bedford Road as occurred over the late-spring bank holiday weekend in 2007. Siltation of the Wardwon Park lake has also reduced flood storage.

The high proportion of sealed surfaces in the headwaters of the Lea catchment increases the risk of flooding within Luton and downstream. Improving flood control in Luton will have benefits for towns further downstream such as Ware and Hertford. Although much of the immediate area around the river north of Luton is unsealed, improving surface permeability by implementing sustainable urban drainage systems (SUDS) within the existing built areas and new developments would enhance the flood regulation service.

Luton Borough Council, the Environment Agency, Thames Water and Affinity Water are four organisations that could be either potential sellers or buyers of a flood related PES scheme.

Luton Borough Council is the ‘Lead Local Flood Authority’ whose responsibilities include:

 Flood investigations.  Maintenance of a register of flood risk features.  Responsible authority for the approval of Sustainable Urban Drainage Systems (SUDS).  Development of a Local Flood Risk Management Strategy.  Undertake consenting works on ordinary water courses.

The Council also has further drainage responsibilities as the Highway Authority.

2.3.3 Climate regulation The climate regulation ecosystems services provided by the River Lea corridor relate to flood regulation and moderation of temperature changes. Grassland areas adjacent to the river provide flood storage capacity and this could be enhanced by implementation of SUDS within new developments. The increased risk of higher intensity rainfall events and greater winter rainfall, anticipated because of global climate change, could be partly attenuated by preserving and enhancing the existing areas of open space within the floodplain.

The existing parks and green spaces along the river corridor provide significant opportunities to moderate temperature. During the summer, transpiration by trees provides a cooling effect. However under dry conditions, trees can also draw more water from the ground which may increase the risk of subsidence as a result of soil shrinkage. Therefore, any PES schemes developed to enhance the climate regulation service need to take a holistic view.

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2.3.4 Habitats for wildlife The river corridor to the north of the town centre provides a haven and corridor for wildlife in what is otherwise a densely populated urban centre. A County Wildlife Site has been designated at Fallowfield covering two ancient fields. The site has been noted for providing a habitat for nesting birds including song thrushes, blackcaps and whitethroats. Other visitors have included herons, kingfishers and water voles.

Leagrave Marsh forms a fragile wetland habitat with several rare plants in Bedfordshire including common twayblade orchid and marsh marigold. Within the woodland, alder and willow predominate. This area hosts a variety of animals, birds, butterflies, dragonflies and damselflies.

Downstream of these sites, ornamental and public parks provide further habitats. The community orchard adjacent to New Bedford Road contains traditional fruit trees and appears to have been in existence since the 1920-1930s. Some restoration work has improved the habitat quality by clearing scrub, the selective pruning of trees, and the planting of some new trees. Wardown Park is a 4.5 ha Edwardian park containing open water lakes, mature trees, shrub and open grassland areas.

Luton Borough Council is actively working to develop and enhance the habitats along the River Lea corridor as part of the Bedfordshire and Luton Green Infrastructure Consortium. This consortium was officially recognised by Government as a Local Nature Partnership (LNP) in 2012. This provides a potential buyer or provider for habitat ecosystem services.

2.3.5 Recreation Much of the route of the River Lea north of the town centre through to Leagrave Common forms part of the waymarked Upper Lea Valley Walk (Travel Luton 2014) providing opportunities for informal recreation. Much of the route in Luton is also shared with National Cycle Network Route 6 (NCN6) and to a lesser extent the Icknield Way. Beyond Leagrave Common access is more restricted as Houghton Regis Brook runs between the rear of residential properties until it meets the M1. No public right of way access exists along this section. Beyond the M1 the brook passes through agricultural land where footpath access to cross the brook exists. Once within the boundaries of Houghton Regis the brook passes through open spaces between housing areas affording informal access to the river corridor.

To the south of the town centre access to the river is more limited. The river can be accessed at Manor Road Park Recreation Ground for approximately 200m but beyond that the river passes into land owned by Vauxhall Motors. Beyond Airport Way the River enters the Luton Hoo estate with no public right of way access.

The current status of the provision of recreational services is good and use of the river corridor is promoted by Luton Borough Council through leaflets, organised events, educational opportunities and signage.

2.3.6 Landscape, visual amenity and health From Leagrave Park to Wardown Park, the River Lea corridor forms an attractive river corridor landscape, breaking up the organised pattern of 20th century urban development. A riverine aesthetic has been preserved that now provides visual contrast with the surrounding areas and gives the local population the opportunity to experience a more natural landscape. Combined with the

18 Cranfield University recreational opportunities, the green space can also provide health benefits, and reductions in noise and air pollution.

The Index of Multiple Deprivation (Department for Communities and local Government, 2011) ranks Luton as the 60th most deprived area in England and follows a decline from previous ranks of 87th in 2007 and 101st in 2004. Luton is ranked 349 out of 404 (a rank of 404 is the lowest life expectancy) for female life expectancy and 266 out of 404 for male life expectancy (ONS, 2011). Coronary heart disease and respiratory disease contribute significantly to the low rates of life expectancy experienced in some wards in Luton. Access to greenspace and opportunities for gentle exercise has been demonstrated to have positive benefits on life expectancy. Landscape and visual amenity improvements are therefore potentially important for delivering cost effective benefits to health provision in Luton.

The Local Nature Partnership, whose remit is to develop landscape scale initiatives and catchment based approaches are working with representatives from the health sector to identify shared priorities and opportunities common to both sectors. The potential benefits to the National Health Service (NHS) could be considerable but defining a PES scheme in this context is challenging in the current economic situation of budgetary restraint.

2.4 Summary The study area is complex and in common with many other urban areas exhibits many legacy issues arising from a long history of urban and industrial development. Much of the area north of the town centre has been subject to development in the recent past (last 50 years) and consists mainly of residential housing. Luton Borough Council and its predecessor authority, Bedfordshire County Council, have retained ownership of much of the land immediately adjacent to the river simplifying the process of developing whole river PES schemes. Many of the ecosystem services described are linked with one service directly impacting on another. Therefore a holistic view is required to identify a PES framework that recognises the linkages and seeks to develop them to maximise the advantages of related services.

Through the workshops it was clear that different stakeholders have different perspectives and therefore will prioritise ecosystem services in different ways. Therefore there is no implied order of priority in the list of ecosystem services given previously or in Table 2.

The workshops identified a range of opportunities that the ecosystem services provide. These are summarised in Table 2. Although they are presented as separate services, it is recognised that they form part of a system and therefore the desired outcomes could potentially be achieved simultaneously by the careful design of an all-encompassing project. However, in this pilot, the vision (section 3.2) was used as the overarching framework within which to integrate a number of smaller projects to achieve the desired outcomes.

The potential benefits to ecosystem services are shown in Figure 4 where expert judgement has been used to assign scores to current status and potential status, where a negative score equates to status below what might be expected and a positive score indicates a status above what might be expected. Increase of ecosystem benefit can be seen for all the ecosystem services considered. Working with the stakeholders, the ecosystem service opportunities were used to identify specific

19 Cranfield University projects that could form part of a PES scheme for the River Lea.

Water quality 3 2 Landscape 1 Reduced and amenity 0 flood risk -1 -2 Current Ecosystem -3 Status Potential Ecosystem Recreation Moderation Benefit and health of climate

Habitat for wildlife

Figure 4: Current ecosystem status and potential ecosystem benefit (based on expert judgement)

Water quality is a dominant issue for the water body itself. The current service provided is poor water quality which in turn affects other services. Water quality varies through geographical space as well as through time. Low flows in the uppermost reaches are natural and may occur more frequently in the future as a result of climate change. Misconnections from domestic properties appear to be a prime cause of the visible pollution seen in the water course. Luton has approximately 77,500 households (LBC 2014). Thames Water estimates that across the Thames region one in ten households is misconnected (Thames Water 2014) equating to 7,750 households within Luton. The ecosystem service improvement that could arise from addressing this problem could have significant benefits to the environment within Luton but also downstream as the river flows through Hertfordshire.

Improvement to water quality is expected to enhance biodiversity. The diversity of within channel flora and fauna is expected to improve as biochemical oxygen demand (BOD) decreases. The ecosystem services provided by the habitats are enhanced also providing increased opportunities for amenity by providing improved sites for educational study and recreation. However, it is recognised that through the culverted sections in the centre of Luton the enhancements to biodiversity would be minimal unless these sections were opened up.

The above ecosystem services improvements must be placed in context of the social and economic environment. Luton residents on average earn less than the national average with over 25% of residents receiving benefits. Nine super output areas (SOAs), statistical reporting areas for the Office for National Statistics, within Luton are in the top 10% most deprived areas nationally (LBC, 2014). Individual households will not currently be able or willing to pay for user-financed PES schemes. Luton Borough Council holds the greatest land holding on and adjacent to the river from the M1 south east to where the river becomes culverted. In this sense, Luton Borough Council is both the ecosystem service buyer and ecosystem service provider, suggesting that a public payment based PES would be most appropriate. However, other potential buyers exist e.g. Thames Water and

20 Cranfield University private companies who may benefit from an improved town centre environment, and Luton Hoo whose lakes form a natural sink for sediment and pollutants. The framework developed in the next section tries to address these issues pointing towards the development of a vision for PES for the River Lea in Luton.

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Table 2: Opportunities for improving ecosystem services with the study area

Ecosystem service Opportunities for enhancing Potential value as a basis for a delivery PES design Water quality Reduced misconnections from Misconnection reduction and residential and commercial filtration of runoff significantly premises improves water quality, Filtration of runoff from reducing water treatment costs transport routes, Luton airport and enhancing biodiversity and properties to reduce potential within and along the pollutants entering the river. river channel.

Flood risk Implementation of SUDS within SUDS slow the transmission of new developments and on runoff to water courses redevelopment sites. reducing frequency and Desilting of Wardown Park intensity of flood events and lakes to increase flood storage hence potential costs of repair capacity. of flood damaged structures. If designed correctly additional benefits can accrue – wildlife, with consequent improvements to ‘well-being’ i.e. the provision of cultural as well as regulating services. Moderation of climate Deculverting of the river Increasing green space has through the centre of Luton been widely recognised as a combined with green space demonstrable means of creation. reducing urban heat island effects whilst also sequestering carbon (see Carbon code (2012) for species specific quantities). Habitat for wildlife Improved connectivity and In part this is linked to diversification of river and improved water quality and riparian habitats. would be expected to help meet BAP targets whilst providing additional value as improved nature sites with enhanced educational value. Recreation and health Enhanced promotion of existing Attraction of visitors from recreation provision and within Luton and further afield development of promoted increasing tourism value whilst routes to the river corridor potentially improving well- from more deprived areas. being and health. Landscape and amenity Deculverting combined with Providing Lutonians with a new landscape design in central focus for the centre of town, Luton to improve attractiveness putting the River Lea back at and enhance property values. the heart of the town, adding value to the attractiveness of Luton as a place to visit.

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3. Proposed framework for urban PES schemes

3.1 Introduction The aim of the Luton PES project was to develop tools, methods and protocols for designing and implementing a PES scheme in a complex urban setting. The outcome was not to have a fully developed PES scheme by the end of the project. It became evident that within the time frame available for the pilot much groundwork was required amongst stakeholders before selecting one or more PES schemes for development. This process of working towards the development of PES proposals will be common in other urban areas and therefore the value of the work done in Luton is seen as an important pointer towards the development of best practice protocols that could be adopted in any urban PES development.

The Luton pilot was strongly supported by Luton Borough Council and the regional office of the Environment Agency. These are two key stakeholder groups with respect to the River Lea:

 Luton Borough Council as the majority landowner along much of its course through Luton and also by actively working along the river corridor through a range of initiatives; and  The Environment Agency who work with the river on a day-to-day basis as part of their remit.

It is expected that in many urban PES schemes the local authority will be required as a stakeholder as they are the planning authority and will therefore be involved in any structural changes made to the built environment. Water is a common theme in many of the PES pilots and therefore it is expected that the Environment Agency will have a significant role in the development of PES schemes. So the identification of key stakeholders is the most important starting point for PES scheme development. ‘Champions’ should be identified who are prepared to see the work through to the preparation, implementation and ongoing monitoring and refinements of PES initiatives.

3.2 A framework for PES development in urban settings

3.2.1 Initial stages At the outset of the Luton pilot there were no clearly defined PES schemes on the table for consideration. However, following the scoping study (Section 1.3.1) the key partners identified that the River Lea provided the opportunity of developing PES schemes that would be applicable in other urban contexts. On this basis, it is recommended that the first action is to provide a forum where stakeholders in any future scheme are brought together.

Initial stakeholder workshop Two questions immediately arise when planning an initial meeting: who should be invited and why should they want to come?

Luton Borough Council and the Environment Agency have established links with organisations and individuals and were able to provide these to the pilot project. It is expected that this would be the case in other urban settings. A balance does need to be struck between representativeness of opinion and the need for manageable numbers. In our experience, attendance of 20-25 people worked well as this allowed smaller group activities to take place within the workshops which

23 Cranfield University enabled a greater range of work activities to be achieved within the day.

A letter of invitation was sent to the initial list of stakeholders identified by Luton Borough Council and the Environment Agency. The letter set out the objectives of the workshop and the expected outcomes. It used positive language to enthuse stakeholders of the value of attending in terms of meeting their individual agendas and contributing to the greater good of the River Lea in Luton.

Eighteen delegates attended the initial stakeholder workshop, and one of the first exercises was to list the combined knowledge of those present. A key aim of this workshop was to identify the initiatives that could be taken forward to improve ecosystems service provision of the River Lea. This included a Strengths, Weaknesses, Opportunities and Threats (SWOT) analysis of identified initiatives providing an objective basis on which to assess those that could form part of a PES scheme. This analysis should follow the best practice guidance provided by Defra (Defra 2013) forming part of ‘Phase 1: Identify a saleable ecosystem service and prospective buyers and sellers’. In the case of the Luton pilot many ecosystems services were considered due to their linkages where specific actions could potentially benefit more than one ecosystem service i.e. the PES concept of ’layering’. At this stage, ideas were not rejected on the basis of cost, as it was important to be aspirational. However it was important that ideas met the basic tenet of a PES scheme i.e. they provide a level of service over-and-above what is already being provided therefore increasing the supply of the service.

The above analysis helped workshop participants to become aware of their dependency on particular ecosystem services. Recognition of the benefits that can accrue is an important part of their willingness to pay for an increment to that service. The workshop therefore provided a forum for stakeholders to learn from each other. This also helped to foster inter- and intra-organisational working. For example, departments such as planning, health and social services within Luton Borough Council may need to work together to deliver ecosystem services.

An unanticipated outcome from the workshop was the recognition that an overarching ‘vision’ or narrative for the river was needed in Luton to guide decision makers. Given the multi-dimensional nature of the ecosystem service provision of the river, it was recognised that the vision would provide a mechanism to maximise, in a holistic way, the benefits of individual initiatives.

Vision development The success of the vision depends on it being accepted by key stakeholders, but crucially in this context, it needed to gain status by being adopted into planning policy and development plans. One way of doing this was to link the vision with the existing framework of green infrastructure planning. A vision is a scalable concept so it can be as relevant to a small local park as to the length of the River Lea through Luton. It is therefore recommended that urban PES schemes develop a vision for their work, providing a focus for the future direction of PES schemes.

In the Luton pilot, vision development underwent several iterations before all stakeholders were content with its balance and focus. It is multi-faceted (Figure 5) reflecting the diverse aspirations of the stakeholders but also the diversity of ecosystem services provided by the River Lea. The vision needs to be comprehensible to different types of stakeholder i.e. from the local authority planner to an individual resident who uses the river corridor to walk their dog. This may involve education to

24 Cranfield University raise the level of understanding within the local population, for example, the destination of their waste water and its impacts. The language used should be clear and free of ‘jargon’.

The vision should also be aspirational, clearly indicating how an improved river ecosystem can provide societal benefits. In the case of Luton, the most visible but also the most complex and expensive initiatives relate to the section of the river running through the centre of town. Deculverting the river here would require resources currently unavailable. However, smaller individual projects where small sections of river were opened could form stepping stones to achieving the greater goal. The vision should be ambitious and challenging, help to leverage additional resources when they become available, and seek to achieve a greater outcome than the simple sum of the parts.

The development of the River Lea vision coincided with the end of the consultation period for the Luton Local Plan (2011 – 2031). Workshop participants arranged for the project team to meet with planning heads within Luton Borough Council to present the vision statement and discuss how it might be incorporated into planning policy within Luton. In making this presentation, it was important that the project team demonstrated ‘buy in’ from a range of stakeholders such as industry, non-government organisations, departmental officers within the council, support of the public, and a working group of organisations prepared to offer some form of investment in the Lea. As a result of the meeting, the project team had the opportunity to assess the relationship between the vision and the existing draft plan and to propose ways in which the vision could be more clearly embedded. The Local Plan is a strategic document that encompasses many aspects of planning within Luton. It was gratifying to note that several elements of the vision statement were encapsulated within the existing draft plan. Seventeen references are made to the river with respect to its place in the environment, deculverting through the town centre, implementation of SUDS linked to flood risk, water quality issues, potential to enhance urban character, importance for biodiversity, and satisfactory disposal of surface and waste water. Specific amendments for incorporation into the Plan were submitted that further embed the concept of the vision. These include specific reference to the river in policies relating to wildlife and recreation, rephrasing wording to align policy with ecosystem service provision and adding an additional sustainability development principle to link to Defra and Environment Agency aims. At the time of writing, the project is waiting to hear whether the proposed amendments have been incorporated.

This pilot contributed through the vision statement to the direction of planning policy over the next 20 years in Luton. However, this will not always be the case and therefore any vision statement developed should be developed within the context of the planning policy framework in place at the time. Aligning the vision to the planning policy is expected to enhance the opportunities of reaching the vision and to provide a framework for PES scheme initiatives.

Planning policy statements have to be expressed in deliverable, rather than aspirational, terms. However a vision, is by its nature, aspirational. To bridge this gap, individual elements of the vision were “hooked” to existing plans or legislation e.g. the Water Framework Directive, Birds Directive and statutory responsibilities, whilst recognising that a PES scheme needs to deliver over and above what is required by regulation or legislation. The ideas underpinning the vision need to be ‘operationalised’ so that specific actions can be progressed and this forms the next stage of the framework. The close involvement of Luton Borough Council officers and their enthusiasm in the

25 Cranfield University pilot project, with the support of the other project partners, provided a foundation from which to progress projects that may not have happened without the pilot project. The vision has provided a focus for officers from various organisations to come together to work towards a common goal.

3.2.2 Selection of PES schemes to take forward Additional workshops will be required to refine the list of potential PES schemes identified in the initial workshop. In the Luton pilot two further workshops were run over a 6 month period with key stakeholders invited. Full stakeholder involvement was important to ensure that a wide range of perspectives. In a more focussed study on one or two PES schemes, a smaller team may be sufficient to develop the PES proposals.

The SWOT analysis highlighted the lack of baseline data, particularly with regard to legacy issues. Knowledge of the chemical and biological nature of the soils and sediments within the catchment is largely unknown. Spot sampling has provided some intelligence but this was insufficient to give a definitive picture of the situation. PES schemes involving the removal, alteration or mobilisation of sediments may have consequences that are not apparent at present both in the physical and economic sense. The analysis has shown that a more in depth baseline dataset is required with perhaps trialling of potential PES schemes accompanied by detailed monitoring. It is expected that this will often be the case within urban areas and therefore the SWOT analysis is a useful vehicle for targeting data collection as well as indicating possible PES scheme trial areas.

The SWOT analysis also provided an initial sift of potential PES schemes as financial constraints means that some schemes are not possible with currently available funding. A PES scheme will only work if buyers are in a position to fund the additional ecosystem services. Under current financial constraints, local authorities have very limited resources to give to initiatives that extend beyond their statutory requirements. Given that in many of the ideas developed in the workshops for PES schemes, Luton Borough Council would be seen as the buyer of additional services; this places a significant limitation on what might be achieved. This is likely to be common across most local authorities. However, Luton Borough Council is also the seller of some ecosystem services and the implementation or otherwise of an initiative may then rest with internal agreements on resource prioritisation within or between departments.

Given the factors above, it is likely that most PES schemes in urban areas will be public-payment based i.e. government pays land or resource managers to enhance ecosystem services on behalf of the wider public (URS 2013). Within Luton there may be the potential to develop public-private payment schemes with private companies with direct links to the river e.g. Vauxhall Motors and Luton Airport. Vauxhall Motors participated actively in the workshops and hosted a day visit to their site where there is no public access to the river. Luton Airport and the airlines operating from there are a major source of employment in the town and the activities at the airport have a significant environmental impact. Engagement with one airline, through the Environment Agency, is at an early stage and it is hoped that they may be interested in buying ecosystem services to reduce their environmental impact on the River Lea.

The multi-faceted nature of the Luton PES framework inherently implies that many years of ongoing work will be required to achieve the vision. Therefore prioritisation of initiatives is likely to be useful. A questionnaire was used with the stakeholders to help this process. This allowed the relationship

26 Cranfield University between impact and cost to be assessed for each potential PES type project. Table 3 shows the structure of the questionnaire used and the list of projects considered. The interventions were grouped according to their type e.g. stakeholder and public engagement, public engagement and data collection, physical changes, liaison with developers and planners, tackling misconnections, and research. All of the returns were collated into a single cost/impact graph (Figure 6); the ringed areas identify broadly the intervention groups listed above. This type of approach demonstrates the understanding of the stakeholders and could aid prioritisation on the basis of constraints but it does not prioritise the actions to be adopted. Discussion and expert opinion is still required to identify the scheme(s) to take forward to full PES proposal development.

3.2.3 Awareness raising The workshops indicated that many stakeholders were unfamiliar with the concept of PES and, to a lesser extent, ecosystem services. This can lead to misunderstandings, suspicion about what it will involve, or rejection of the process if they are not able to grasp its intent. Others will be interested and want to know more to help them formulate PES schemes in their own context.

In the Luton pilot, we sought to address this by inviting presenters to the workshops who could provide technical information regarding specific options relevant to potential PES schemes, such as SUDS methods or existing PES projects. This was an effective way of raising stakeholder awareness of what is achievable, within specific cost and time constraints. We incorporated these sessions as part of our workshop activities so that the presenters were able to participate directly in the development of ideas. It is recommended that a similar approach is taken in the development of other urban based PES schemes.

3.3 Summary Urban areas are inherently complex due to multiple land owners, many potential stakeholders and legacy issues arising from past urban land use. Effective PES development within the urban context will require the active participation of all the local authorities whose areas cover the PES project area. Where more than one local authority is involved, collaboration will required between them to ensure the smooth implementation of a PES scheme. The nature of the proposed PES scheme will determine whether national agencies, such as the Environment Agency, should be major partners alongside the local authorities in the project. In the case of Luton, Luton Borough Council and Central Bedfordshire Council are the planning authorities and the Environment Agency is keen to see the Water Framework Directive targets met for the river.

Stakeholder consultation is seen as being key to the success of PES scheme developments in urban areas. Using the existing networks of staff within Luton Borough Council and the Environment Agency, good representation of the varied interests concerning the river within the town were invited to the project workshops. The workshops were an excellent way to bring people together in a relaxed atmosphere to provide their insights and desires for the development of the River Lea. The consistently high turnout demonstrated their ‘buy-in’ to the process.

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Improved

water quality

Creates a Town environment

‘necklace of attracts commerce jewels’

Defining

feature of the Safe healthy town recreation

Improved

riparian habitats Becomes a and landscapes visitor attraction

Downstream The river integrates benefits activities in Luton and the wider landscape – Reconnects communities socially, economically

with each other, Luton’s and environmentally heritage and the river

Figure 5: Summary of the vision for the River Lea (Note the illustration is representative of a successful river restoration on the River Skerne and is not the River Lea)

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A key outcome from the process was the development of a vision, which could provide a foundation for any PES project to be implemented along the River Lea in Luton. The vision provides the holistic view, specifying the overarching targets that the PES projects are trying to achieve. A clearly defined destination will help promote the integrated formulation of individual projects. The Luton study was not limited to a single site but to multiple sites along a river corridor. Therefore it was important that the core elements of the vision either corresponded to or could be incorporated into the Local Plan and thereby future planning decisions. Alignment of the vision with planning policy is seen as essential to its success.

Once a vision has been established the details of the individual PES schemes can be formulated and tested against the vision for alignment. Techniques such as SWOT analysis are a useful tool in this process to prioritise initiatives from a range of possible options that will optimise the benefits to the ecosystem services addressed by the vision.

Box 1 summarises the framework that has been implemented in the pilot project which could be taken and applied to other urban contexts.

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Box 1: Key elements of the framework

1. Define the spatial extent of the PES initiative to identify local authority areas; statutory, national and local designations; land use/cover; land ownership (where known).

2. Identify key stakeholders who could be buyers, sellers, intermediaries and providers of expertise.

3. Work with key stakeholders to identify other stakeholders who should be part of the PES

project development e.g. business, voluntary groups, NGOs.

4. Identify and meet key decision makers within the local authorities whose responsibilities cover the project area to involve them early on in the PES scheme development and to align project outcomes to local policies

5. Use one or more workshops to define a vision that all stakeholders can sign up to, enabling PES projects to be developed that will meet the aspirations of the vision and is aligned to, or where feasible informs, local planning policy.

6. Collect baseline data on the current status of ecosystem services as a precursor to project plan formulation to identify where ecosystem service provision could be enhanced.

7. Develop a list of potential projects, each of which contributes to the achievement of the vision, which can be defined, meets the requirements of a PES project and where buyers, sellers, intermediaries, providers of expertise and degree of additionality are identified.

8. Test potential projects using techniques such as SWOT analysis and cost/impact assessment to select projects to take forward and to structure their implementation.

9. Present the overall project plan to stakeholders for approval.

10. Implement, monitor and refine as required.

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Table 3: River Lea – Actions/ Interventions Questionnaire

Action/Intervention Environ. Social Economic Cost Who would Who might Time Horizon impact impact impact benefit? pay? in which impacts will be seen (Rate 1-5, where 1 is very low and 5 is 1 - £’00s 1-3 yrs = 1 very high) 2 - £’000s 3-10 yrs = 2 3 - £’0,000s 10+ yrs = 3 4 - £’00,000s 5 - £mns Stakeholder and public engagement 1. Continue to fund engagement activities amongst stakeholders regarding the River Lea 2. Illustrate and communicate the vision via a range of public and stakeholder engagement activities. 3. Develop an “outdoor classroom” along the river and install information boards with scientific and historical information about the Lea. 4. Improve connectivity between communities either side of the river. 5. Organise litter picking days around the river. Public engagement and data collection 6. Distribute water quality test strips to houses/ businesses along the river for regular testing. Request that people submit their results periodically.

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7. Initiate regular biodiversity monitoring walks for the public. 8. Develop a “big river survey” app to collect data in Luton and elsewhere Physical changes 9. Install new SUDS and replace ineffective ones, adding buffer zones around car parks and roads. 10. Initiate a bank management scheme to maintain and improve biodiversity, water flow and contributions to landscape. 11. Deculvert key sections of the river to improve accessibility. 12. Develop green roof projects. 13. De-silt the Luton Hoo and Wardown lakes 14. Conduct further investigations into possible pollution at the Luton Hoo lakes in order to make improved recommendations. 15. Initiate a scheme to improve to species diversity along the river. 16. Tackle invasive non-native plant species (perhaps via an “outdoor gym” scheme) Liaison with developers and planners 17. Liaise with Bride Hall developers to get the best possible outcome at this site.

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18. Liaise with the Central Beds Houghton North Development to get the best possible outcome at this site. 19. Liaise with the Power Court development to get the best possible outcome at this site. 20. Develop a scheme that requires developers to “offset” environmental impacts to the river. 21. Develop an information “pack” for developers and planners which describes the vision, how they can contribute, and what LBC is likely to accept. Tackling misconnections 22. Introduce an eco-plumber scheme to proactively resolve misconnections. 23. Employ a ‘misconnections’ officer at LBC to follow cases through to resolution. Research 24. Introduce a long-term water quality and species diversity monitoring programme throughout the river Lea to identify the levels, sources and impacts of pollution on the river surrounding ecosystem. 25. Re-invest in the “green spaces database” which holds information on the use of UK green spaces, to assist in the valuation of cultural ecosystem services.

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5 11 Physical alterations 13 9

4 12

22 Misconnections 4 25 21 3 24 Research 10 14 16 23 6 3 15

COST 8 Biodiversity 20 17 18 2 19 7 2 1 5 Developers and 1 planners

Public engagement 0 0 2 4 6 IMPACT 8 10 12 14

Figure 6: Cost/impact of possible PES schemes 34 Cranfield University

4 Proposed PES schemes for river improvement in Luton This section comprises two potential PES schemes: dealing with pipe misconnections, and the development of Leagrave Park.

4.1 Misconnections The walkover survey undertaken as part of the scoping study suggested that wastewater from residential properties was entering the River Lea. Evidence of increased phosphorus loading and discoloration of the water were two indicators noted during the survey. Water UK (2013) estimates that about 300,000 homes in the UK discharge wastewater into local rivers rather than into the foul water sewer. Most of this wastewater arises from sinks, baths and washing machines, and perhaps toilets. The misconnections can arise from poor building control and home improvement projects undertaken by individual householders.

Homeowners are responsible by law for making sure that their waste pipes are properly connected, even if the current owner did not carry out the work or contract a plumber that has created the misconnection (landlords are responsible in rented properties). However, anecdotal evidence suggests that householders are generally not aware that their drainage systems may be misconnected, they have legal responsibilities to ensure their drainage systems are properly connected or the implications for the water courses receiving waste water. Information is available to water users on water company websites that sets out the responsibilities of the property owner and the implications to the environment of misconnections, for example, Thames Water (https://www.thameswater.co.uk/help-and-advice/8198.htm ), and also via the ConnectRight campaign supported by the Environment Agency.

From surveys that have been undertaken by the water industry, homes built in the 1960s and 1970s are the most likely to have waste pipe misconnections. This correlates well with the date of housing development in a large area of the River Lea catchment to the north of Luton town centre. After interviews with seven plumbers in Luton, four indicated that they had minimal knowledge about misconnections. Of the remaining three, one respondent estimated that 60 – 70% were not properly connected. It was also stated the problems were particularly acute in council housing (Dakurah 2013).

Water UK and the Environment Agency (2009) have published a good practice guide for the investigation and rectification of drainage misconnections, providing an established procedure for identifying and dealing with misconnections. The good practice guidance states that the water and sewerage company ‘ensures that the funding is in place to undertake the project’ and ‘raises a purchase order for the work to investigate and facilitate rectification’. This presupposes that the water and sewerage company have initiated a survey for misconnections. Thames Water work with the Environment Agency to identify rivers that are being polluted by wrongly connected pipework. A survey is undertaken to identify which sewers are polluting, after which house-to-house surveys are undertaken to identify polluting properties. Homeowners are then notified of the problem and offered help and advice. If a householder does not voluntarily take action once a problem has been identified, a notice can be served to correct the drainage, incurring costs that will exceed those that would have been incurred if the work had been done voluntarily. Also, action can be taken

35 Cranfield University dependent upon damage to the environment, where a fine or imprisonment can be imposed.

In the context of this project, the key question is whether correcting misconnections could form one component of a PES scheme for the River Lea to alleviate the poor water quality status of the river. Using PES terminology, the water and sewerage company would be the buyer of services provided by local plumbers, acting on behalf of local residents, who would undertake the survey and rectification work (Thames Water has an approved list of ‘Water Regulations’ approved plumbers; the company listed for Luton is based in Macclesfield). Under the current system, the polluter pays principle applies but the rectification of misconnections on this basis has been a slow process. The proposed PES scheme would provide a mechanism for speeding up the process of identifying and fixing problems, achieving ecosystem service benefits in a shorter timeframe not only to water quality but other ecosystem services as other projects can be implemented as water quality improves.

4.1.1 The ‘Eco-plumber’ concept The aim of the scheme is to assist residents in identifying and resolving their misconnections by providing the free services of plumbers to survey and rectify any issues found. The scheme would take the following approach:

 One or more plumbers will be identified from the local area that has the experience necessary to identify and resolve misconnections.  The free service will be advertised via local media and mailshot to raise awareness of the service on offer.  The qualified plumber(s) will respond to requests for a survey by householders.  The plumber will be paid a set cost for each appointment, to encourage attendance at as many properties as possible.  Once a problem is identified, materials and labour costs for rectification will be paid.  Quality assurance procedures will be put in place by the water and sewerage company to ensure that standards of work criteria are met.  Constant monitoring of the scheme to track its impact will be through data collections such as: o Number of household misconnections rectified. o Annual waste water outflow from these properties. o Estimated annual prevention of waste water leakage across Luton. o Estimated cost saving for water companies.

Dakurah (2013) has estimated the costs of rectification once a problem has been identified following consultation with plumbers in Luton. The cost of materials is variable depending upon the extent of new pipework that is required. Groundwork may be required to resolve the misconnection and this again will be a variable cost and in turn will incur variable labour costs. Based on the information received from plumbers and taking an average cost for each component, the cost for installing new pipework per household is given in Table 4.

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Table 4: Estimated cost of installing new pipework

Input description/materials Cost (£) New pipes (2-3 m) 15 Fitting 25 Labour: hole drilling (0.5 -1 hour) + 2 hours of installation 200 Total 240

However, a more significant cost is incurred in tracing sources of pollution back to their source. The process is time consuming and requires specialist contractors, typically costing five or six times the cost of correction per property (RICS, 2010).

The environmental and financial impact of misconnections has never been fully ascertained, with estimations from Defra and the Environment Agency giving very divergent views (UKWIR, 2011). Although, the implications of misconnections, both financial and environmental, are stated in many places no actual figures have been found to assess the cost benefit of implementing an eco-plumber scheme. However, an indicative figure has been calculated by Dakurah (2013) where he analysed the cost of correcting a misconnection versus the cost of removing phosphate pollution at water treatment works as might arise from misconnected washing machines. Based on figures from Eriksson et al (2002), the cost of removing phosphate varied from £6.85 – £25.79 per household per year. Assuming the cost of correcting the misconnection is spread over 15 years i.e. £16 per year, the benefit of correcting the misconnection is greater than the cost of phosphate removal if the higher costs are used. However, it is recognised that this does not give the complete picture as removal of phosphorus will also have other benefits on eutrophication, pH and other environmental factors.

The recent relaunch (February 2014) of ConnectRight (http://www.connectright.org.uk/ ), demonstrates the importance that is attached to the issue of misconnections. This is the public face of the National Misconnections Strategy Group made up of a range of partners including the Environment Agency, Water UK and water companies.

4.1.2 Key PES characteristics of the scheme Broadly, this scheme fits into the category of a ‘One-to-many’ buyer/seller relationship, where the single buyer is the water and sewerage company, and the sellers are the plumbers acting on behalf of the local residents to enhance water quality. However, it is recognised that other buyers and sellers could be included if a wider range of ‘piggy back’ ecosystem service benefits are included (Table 5).

Thames Water would be the primary buyer for this PES as they are expected to be the ultimate beneficiary in terms of lower water treatment costs. As indicated in the previous section, in the good practice guide it is the water and sewerage company who would pay for the survey and remediation works. However, in this case, that payment is being made indirectly to householders by paying plumbers for the improvement in water quality by fixing misconnections.

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Table 5: Potential buyers, sellers and intermediaries for the ‘Eco-plumber’ PES

Ecosystem Potential Provider Potential Buyer Intermediary Providing Service Expertise Water Quality Plumbers on Thames Water Luton Borough Environment behalf of Council Agency, Thames residents Water Habitat for Plumbers on Local Nature Luton Borough Natural England, Wildlife behalf of Partnership Council River Restoration residents Businesses for Centre biodiversity offsets Landscape and Plumbers on Luton Borough Groundwork Health behalf of Council residents National Health Luton Borough Service Council

As the scheme becomes effective delivering improvement to the water quality ecosystem service, other ecosystem services can be improved encompassing a wider range of potential buyers as indicated in Table 5. It is anticipated that as water quality stabilises, habitat for wildlife and landscape and health ecosystem services will become more important in the buyer/seller relationship. The Local Nature Partnership and conservation groups might see that additional biodiversity value could be created once the water quality shows signs of improvement, providing opportunities to apply for grants to enable habitat improvements to be implemented. Businesses involved in developments where loss of biodiversity might occur, for example the proposed Houghton Regis housing development to the west of the M1, may be interested in compensating for onsite losses by biodiversity offsetting. Luton Borough Council could act as a buyer of landscape services as improvements to water quality allow the implementation of landscape enhancement schemes in the riparian zone around the watercourse. As the landscape is improved, the attractiveness of the river corridor will be enhanced providing opportunities for the promotion of walking routes which in turn help to contribute to people’s sense of well-being and the health benefits that can then ensue. Local health and care services working in conjunction with the local authority could work together to fund this type of initiative.

There is also a role for intermediaries. As Luton Borough Council is a major land holder along the River Lea corridor, it already works with a range of partners to deliver ecosystem services. It can therefore facilitate the working together of different organisations ensuring that the long term vision for the river can be achieved. Groundwork is active in Luton and work in collaboration with a number of partners on a range of projects. They can provide wider benefits such as employment and training.

4.1.3 Taking the scheme forward Initial discussions have been held with Thames Water with the following outcomes:

 They would not be keen to pay for the resolution of everyone’s misconnections via the eco- plumber scheme.

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 Potentially the scheme could evolve to help vulnerable and low income individuals who would not be able to afford the resolution of the misconnection issue themselves.  The idea will be discussed further with Thames Water through the River Lea Catchment Partnership established during the PES project.

The next steps for taking this PES scheme forward are:

 Detailed discussion with Thames Water to identify the mechanism by which the scheme could be implemented.  Identification of suitable plumbers in the Luton area who are willing to participate in the scheme and receive training in the tasks required.  Source funding for community outreach to inform the residents of Luton about the importance of dealing with misconnections and how this can be done, perhaps using a similar model to the ‘Let’s stop the block’ campaign in Cardiff (http://www.dwrcymru.com/en/News-Summary/2013/11/Cardiff-Help-us-Stop-the- Block.aspx ).  Discuss with social housing providers how drainage inspections could be incorporated into maintenance visits to identify the scale of the issue in these properties.  Implementation of a pilot scheme for a representative area in Luton to determine the scale of the misconnection problem.

4.2 Leagrave Park

4.2.1 Introduction Leagrave Park occupies about 24 ha of the former Leagrave Marsh Farm agricultural holding. It was created in 1935 from the original marshland and adjacent grazed and arable farmland. A substantial area of the marsh was reclaimed in the mid-1950s leaving the smaller Leagrave Marsh that can still be seen today. The site contains nationally and regionally important historical and natural features, including Waulud’s Bank Scheduled Monument, Marsh House, a former Victorian farmhouse and the official rising of the River Lea and associated water courses. It also includes an elm, beech and wet woodland, conservation grassland, and local cultural and heritage associations. Other features include sports pitches, a bowls club, a sports pavilion, two play areas, a BMX track, and two car parks.

Leagrave Park is situated in north west of Luton, and it’s one of the biggest parks in the town. The park is surrounded by housing and is bounded by Sundon Road and the Midland Mainline railway to the west. To the east is the Marsh Farm estate, with a population of approximately 9,000 relying on the park for green space and play facilities. Wards surrounding the park are Sundon Park, Leagrave, Northwell, Bramingham and Limbury with a total population of 42,296 (Groundwork and Luton Borough Council, 2009a). These communities surrounding Leagrave Park are included in the 10% most deprived in the East of England and one of the communities is amongst the 10% most deprived nationally.

In 2008/2009 Groundwork undertook a comprehensive study of the condition of the park assessing the Waulud’s Bank Scheduled Monument, Marsh house and its surrounding area, natural heritage features, sports and informal play facilities and access to and within the park. Groundwork used a

39 Cranfield University variety of techniques to consult with visitors and non-visitors to Leagrave Park. Most data was collected using GreenSTAT questionnaires, which were distributed to 7,350 households in the area surrounding the site with a freepost envelope for return. At the conclusion of the process, 447 people participated in the consultation process and 356 GreenSTAT questionnaires were completed. In the study they reported that 75% of people walked to the park, that 18.5% cycled and that 6.5% came by car. The study also reported the amount of time that people took travelling to the park. An overall park plan was developed that sought to address the vulnerabilities identified in the survey and set out detailed opportunities for preservation, interpretation and enhancement of the park. Detailed costings for each element of the plan were calculated giving a total of approximately £4.7m to deliver all elements of the plan.

The park is distinctive in that it potentially provides a number of ecosystem services for multiple users of those services. Table 6 summarises the main ecosystem services provided and Table 7 describes the contribution that each element in the park provides.

Table 6: Ecosystem services provided by elements within Leagrave Park

Water quality Flood Wildlife Recreation Landscape and regulation and health amenity Waulud’s   Bank Marsh House   Leagrave      Marsh Wet woodland      Grasslands    River Lea     

The key aims of the Leagrave Park project are as follows (Groundwork and Luton Borough Council 2009):

 To preserve and enhance the historic and natural heritage features of the park.  To create a welcoming and accessible park that encourages access by all visitors and promotes understanding.  To maximise the health, cultural, educational and social benefits of the park to meet the needs of the local community.  To deliver high quality, co-ordinated green space management and maintenance across the site.

To achieve these aims, sets of objectives have been formulated for each of the Leagrave Park elements. Each has been costed and is supported by a management plan.

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Table 7: Description of Leagrave Park elements

Leagrave Park elements Description Waulud’s Bank The D shaped bank encloses and an area of 7 ha. A number of Neolithic and Bronze Age finds have been discovered. A recent geophysical survey suggests an iron Age settlement. Marsh House The current building is the Victorian farm house comprising a two storey detached building. The building has been used for a range of community activities but currently lies empty. There has been an aspiration to develop the building as a heritage and interpretation centre. Leagrave Marsh The extent of the marsh is much reduced where once it extended to the railway embankment on the western edge of the park. It contains a wide range of wetland plants although some rare plants have been lost through drying out. Marsh recreation is helping to redress this situation. Wet woodland The woodland was managed as an amenity park until the late 1980s – closely mown grass and kept tidy with little allowance for natural development. Management since has been less severe allowing fallen timber to rot in situ. A coppice of willows has been planted around the source of the River Lea. This provides enhanced landscape and amenity value, also providing opportunities for education. Grassland Grassland management varies across the park. The sports pitches are regularly mown but the grassland on and around Waulud’s bank is now subject to conservation management resulting in a broad diversity of vegetation and other wildlife. River Lea As a chalk stream this is a BAP priority habitat. As has been shown previously, the water quality is affected by input from storm drains, misconnections and runoff from roads. Berms have been installed to create a more natural channel flow combined with restoration of the adjacent areas of marshland.

4.2.2 Key PES characteristics of the scheme Although a detailed plan for enhancements to Leagrave Park has been priced and costed (Groundwork and Luton Borough Council 2009), the financial situation in local government has precluded the implementation of the plan and therefore a PES scheme might provide the mechanism by which the plan could be taken forward. As can be seen from Table 6, multiple ecosystem service benefits would accrue from the Leagrave Park plan. Table 8 shows that the ecosystem services would form a ‘layered’ approach where a bundle of services for the same land area is sold to different buyers. As an example, a stage 1 Biffa Award bid has been submitted by Groundwork, acting as an intermediary, for practical habitat and access work at the source of the River Lea in the Park. This bid has been successful and will now go forward as a full stage 2 proposal. In support of this, a bid for third party funding from Natural England has also been successful. Natural England is therefore acting as one of the buyers to enhance ecosystem service delivery for habitat as well as the local landscape within the Park.

Similarly, a small project will be implemented in the summer of 2014 that will provide a training scheme for the unemployed to build a boardwalk through the wet woodland area increasing

41 Cranfield University recreational ecosystem services provision. The part funding buyers in this project are the Department for Work and Pensions and Luton Airport, with Groundwork acting as the intermediary. The buyers in the boardwalk project are tertiary buyers who are purchasing ecosystem service provision on behalf of the wider public. Although the primary aim of the work is to provide training for the unemployed, not an ecosystem service as such, the physical outcome will be providing additional recreational ecosystem provision compared to what is currently available.

Table 8: Potential buyers, sellers and intermediaries for Leagrave Park PES

Ecosystem Potential Provider Potential Buyer Intermediary Providing Service Expertise Water quality Luton Borough Thames Water Environment Council Natural England Agency, Thames Water Habitat for Luton Borough Local Nature Groundwork Natural England, wildlife Council Partnership River Restoration Natural England Centre Businesses for biodiversity offsets Recreation Luton Borough Department for Groundwork Council Work and Pensions Luton Airport User groups (e.g. football, cyclists) Landscape and Luton Borough Luton Borough Groundwork Natural England health Council Council Natural England National Health Service

Delivering the full suite of ecosystem services benefits will require a public-private payment scheme involving many potential buyers but only one provider. Therefore this will be a ‘many to one’ PES. Luton Borough Council as the land owner for the majority of the park area is the single provider but would also be one of the beneficiaries, gaining value from the enhancements to ecosystem services. Some of the buyers listed in Table 8 are already contributing towards the delivery of the ecosystem service improvements by providing funding, applying for grants and providing volunteer works. Others have not yet been approached to participate in the development of the Park

It is expected that formal recreational use of the sports pitches by clubs will be paid for by the users where the fee will be set at a commensurate level to cover ongoing maintenance costs. However, it is recognised that the park has open access and therefore informal recreation cannot be charged under the present arrangements. In fact, charging users for informal access to the park is not desirable in terms of maximising the wider societal benefits that the park provides.

In the early stages of taking the Leagrave Park project forward, the role of the intermediary, in particular Groundwork, has been very important identifying potential funders of projects. However,

42 Cranfield University in the future it may be that other non-governmental organisations such as the local Wildlife Trust could take on the management of the Leagrave Marsh and grassland areas therefore fulfilling an intermediary role.

4.2.3 Next steps The next steps for taking this PES scheme forward are:

 Prepare and submit the stage 2 Biffa Award bid for enhancements to habitat and landscape ecosystem services  Explore whether Higher Level Stewardship funds could be used to deliver enhancements to habitat ecosystem services. Luton Borough Council has recently successfully applied for this funding.  Maximise the strong local interest that has been shown in the park by encouraging volunteering at events held in the park to manage ecosystem services  It is unlikely that the total amount of funding required will become available in one tranche, therefore grant applications should be made for incremental improvements to work towards the overall vision for the park.

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5. Conclusions and lessons learnt

5.1 Conclusions The aim for this study was to develop tools, methods and protocols for designing and implementing a PES scheme in a complex urban setting using the River Lea within Luton as a case study area. Within the 12 month period of the project it has not been possible to fully meet this aim but the foundational building blocks have been established from which PES schemes could be taken forward to implementation.

5.1.1 Achieving the objectives of the study A number of objectives were set at the outset of the project and many of these have been broadly met:

 Provision of facilitated meetings to engage a wide range of stakeholders was very successful with four workshops held over the course of the project. A good representation of stakeholders was present at each meeting although business community representation was limited. The outcomes from each workshop were positive with clear actions to take forward to develop the next phase of the project. The workshops helped to cement existing relationships and foster new collaborations.

 Many potential actions were identified in the workshops that would contribute to the restoration of natural capital stocks. These helped to inform the development of the vision that provided a framework within which to prioritise those actions to take forward in the first instance. The multiple stressors, ranging from physical factors, economic conditions and institutional relationships, became apparent through discussion with stakeholders at the workshops.

 It was recognised through the workshops that many of the potential benefits accruing from individual schemes are intangible in nature, for example, attributing improved health statistics to improved visual amenity leading to increased walking along the river corridor. Other benefits are more tangible, for example, reduced water treatment costs arising from the rectification of misconnections. Institutional barriers were identified between organisations and within organisations. For a PES scheme to be successful within an urban context inter-organisational and intra-organisational working will be required. Potential funders of PES activities in Luton have been identified but within the time frame of the project it was not possible to fully explore which of these could be utilised to begin the PES implementation.

 A data resource and forum for collective management of natural capital and ecosystem services was provided in the form of a blog site and was available to all stakeholders. On reflection this facility could have been used more proactively to disseminate information and data. However, the presence of the project on the web provides exposure of the project to a wider range of stakeholders which in turn may lead to wider public involvement in the implementation of PES schemes in Luton.

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 The primary outcome, developed in consultation with all stakeholders, was the vision providing an initial framework for PES activities in Luton. The multi-faceted nature of the urban environment requires a holistic vision for the multiple ecosystem services that could benefit from PES schemes. The vision provides a springboard from which PES schemes can be prioritised whilst ensuring that their outcomes are integrated so that the vision can be achieved.

5.1.2 Research outcomes The project has produced outcomes that are applicable at different scales and in other urban areas:

 Locally: the vision statement has been developed and presented to the heads of planning in Luton Borough Council. As a result, the opportunity was provided to incorporate elements of the vision into the Local Plan. This approach is relevant to all local authorities as they have planning authority for developments. However, heads of planning need to have ‘operationalised’ project proposals to gain their support. Without their ‘buy-in’, the chances of achieving the vision could be compromised.

 Regionally: implementation of the eco plumber concept to rectify misconnections could have regional importance for the Lea catchment in terms of reduced water treatment costs and improved water quality benefitting habitats, landscape and amenity. Many tributaries of the Lea also have significant urban areas within their catchments and the successful implementation of a misconnection rectification scheme in these areas would enhance the regional benefits.

 Nationally: the team have taken part in the workshop organised by the Ecosystems Knowledge Network where the lessons learnt were shared with other pilot PES projects. The involvement of the Environment Agency as one of the stakeholders in the project provides the opportunity for dissemination of the results of this work to other Environment Agency regions.

5.2 Lessons learnt

5.2.1 Development of the vision One of the outcomes from the first workshop was the recognition that an overall vision was required to provide a framework within which to develop individual PES schemes. The complexity of urban environments and the interactions between many ecosystem services requires a holistic perspective to ensure that the maximum benefits can accrue from the combined outputs of individual schemes. But the vision requires ‘ownership’ if it is to be effective and therefore it was recognised that the core principles of the vision would need to be incorporated into the Local Plan and hence have ‘buy- in’ from the heads of planning within a local authority. Fortuitously the Luton Local Plan for 2011 – 2031 was in the final stages of consultation during the period of the project and therefore the opportunity was provided to feed into the consultation process. Once incorporated, future development control would be aligned to the principles of the vision, enhancing the likelihood that new developments would contribute to improving ecosystem service provision.

The underlying nature of a vision is that it should be ambitious and challenging. It should not be

45 Cranfield University constrained by current resourcing issues but should focus on the desired outcome for ecosystem service provision. However, planning policy now has to be deliverable, non-deliverable aspirations are no longer acceptable. Therefore, the vision has to be stated in terms where deliverable actions can be easily attributed and it is critical to demonstrate the cumulative benefits to the various ecosystem services and the potential cost savings. Implementation of the vision should take advantage of resources as and when they become available, with each contribution contributing to a whole which is greater than the sum of the parts.

It is also important to recognise the time scales that may be involved to achieve the vision. The time taken to deliver the vision will be affected by many factors including resource availability, policy, availability of ‘champions’ to take initiatives forward and willingness of stakeholder involvement. It may be that a 20 year time scale or even longer is required to fully effect a vision but ideally a vision should include aspirations and benefits that can be confidently gained in the short period along with aspirations that ensure no further deterioration.

Engaging the public is seen as being important to its success. This may involve education to raise the level of understanding within the local population of where their water goes and the linkages between ecosystem services. A good example of this is the Cardiff: Help us Stop the Block project (Welsh Water 2014) where school children are given interactive lessons by Welsh Water’s education team and Welsh Water’s Blockbuster teams will visit food businesses, nurseries and homes to show people what they can do to reduce the problem of sewer blockages. Providing opportunities for local people to engage with the vision in local parks and through local media will be important to promote the success of the vision. The message must be clear and understandable i.e. free of jargon. An important part of two of the stakeholder workshops was to invite presentations from existing projects or those working in the area of ecosystem service enhancement, to raise the level of awareness techniques and ways of working that can be used to practically implement PES schemes.

5.2.2 Formulating projects in PES terms Although the basic concept of PES is straightforward i.e. buyers purchase ecosystem services from sellers to provide additionality of ecosystem service provision, the formulation of projects in PES terms proved to be less straightforward. Individual project ideas arising from the workshop discussions were described in non PES terms (Table 3) as this is the ‘language’ that stakeholders were familiar with. During the first two workshops, the PES concept was explained but it did not provide the focus for the discussions because it was important at the outset to define the vision within which projects could be identified, that when taken together would achieve the aspirations of the vision. It was seen as important to capture all ideas at this stage, whether or not they could be implemented within a PES context, so that a holistic view of what could be achieved was established. In this sense, the activity could have taken place with or without being part of a PES project. However, the eco-plumber concept was derived wholly from the PES perspective after the problem of misconnections was highlighted as an issue in the River Lea.

The selection and prioritisation of projects to take forward was based on the PES concept. The questionnaire asked respondents to identify who they considered to be the buyers and sellers for each project therefore providing a wide range of views from which a consensus could be derived and giving the starting point for formulating each project in PES terms. However, one weakness with the approach adopted was that the concept of additionality was not explicitly incorporated into the

46 Cranfield University project selection and prioritisation process. Many of the possible mechanisms for funding the project ideas considered could be viewed as recycling of money within the local authority, as they are both the buyer and seller of ecosystem services. Therefore, the question can legitimately be raised as to the degree of additionality that might be gained given that the local authority could be undertaking this work anyway as part of its remit.

In reviewing the degree to which stakeholders in the workshops were able to align their thinking to the PES concept, two issues become apparent. The concept of ecosystem services was unfamiliar to some and secondly, the concept of buyers and sellers of ecosystem services was unfamiliar to most of the stakeholders. Although both concepts were explained in the workshops, they require a different way of thinking about the environment. One suggestion that might help understanding in the early stages of PES scheme development would be to have one or more case studies presented that demonstrate how a PES scheme within an urban context can work. Given the early stage development of urban PES schemes in the UK, we were not in a position to provide this. However, we did provide case study examples of SUDS implementation and the benefits arising from these which helped to raise expectations of what could be achieved in a PES scheme.

5.2.3 Working within the constraints of funding availability In the current financial climate, funding options within local authorities are limited. Luton faces many pressures on its resources not least the requirement to provide an additional 26,000 houses by 2013 that will potentially impose greater impacts on the ecosystem services of the River Lea. Housing developers could contribute to PES schemes to meet their obligations under the planning systems using S106 payments or a Community Infrastructure Levy as a payment mechanism. However, in the case of Luton these funds are likely to be very limited due to other existing calls on this funding. But this should not be seen as barrier to implementing PES schemes. This situation provides new opportunities to engage the public and work with local stakeholders. This is the ethos of the Water Framework Directive and also the rivers trusts. The wildlife trust needs to be encouraged to work with the council in this respect since they champion the role of a rivers trust for this area in conjunction with the Thames Rivers Trust. The trusts provide opportunities to bid for other money, such as Esmee Fairbairn. Also, Heritage Lottery Funding has been used in the past to undertake the preparation of the Leagrave Park proposals and this should be explored again for the PES schemes.

Luton has successfully applied for Higher Level Stewardship. This will provide an enhanced level of funding for managing the river corridor to the north of the town centre and may provide some support for the development of Leagrave Park.

In the current economic climate it will be important to maximise the benefits from any funding obtained. Formulating projects that deliver multiple ecosystem services benefits and demonstrate a coordinated approach will be more attractive to potential funders. This will potentially bring together multiple buyers and sellers spreading the funding burden but on the downside increasing the project management complexity.

5.2.4 Importance of stakeholder participation Stakeholder participation has been important throughout the project. It was essential to have Luton Borough Council and the Environment Agency as project partners as they were able to provide links

47 Cranfield University to stakeholders who could actively participate in the workshops. Although employees of the partner organisations made up the majority of the stakeholders at the workshops they did represent those sectors that would be involved in the implementation of PES schemes.

All of the outputs from the project have been derived from stakeholder participation in the workshops. Without their involvement the objectives of the project would not have been met. The business community was represented by one company, Vauxhall Motors, who have been one of the largest employers in the town in the past. It was recognised that it would be difficult to gain business interest at this early stage in the PES process. Clearly defined projects linked directly to the overall vision are needed before approaching the business community as potential buyers of ecosystem services. In retrospect, the pilot project did not engage sufficiently with the business community. Even at the early stages of stages of PES scheme development, the business community are important stakeholders in their potential roles of buyers and sellers of ecosystem services. It is also important to establish what priorities businesses might have in working with their local communities as part of their corporate social responsibility agenda and, if applicable, fulfilling their Environment Management System objectives. For example, Thomson Airways have recently been in contact with the Environment Agency with regard to mitigating their environmental impact. This way of working will be very important for taking PES schemes forward as it will help to cement relationships between businesses and their local communities and environment. Fora, such as the local chamber of commerce and Business Improvement Districts, could be appropriate mechanisms for this initiative.

Although individual members of the public were not involved in a meaningful way, representatives from voluntary organisations were involved. These stakeholders provided a different perspective often questioning the realistic viability of project ideas being proposed. This provided useful input into the process.

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Annex

Annex A: List of organisations represented at the project workshops

 Luton Borough Council

 Environment Agency

 Luton Friends of Parks and Green Spaces

 Bedfordshire Rural Communities Charity

 Luton Friends of the Earth

 The Better Thames Network

 The Wildlife Trust for Bedfordshire, Cambridgeshire & Northamptonshire

 Defra -Ecosystems Evidence Unit

 Groundwork Luton & Bedfordshire

 Cranfield University

 University of Bedfordshire

 Central Bedfordshire Council

 Vauxhall Motors (UK)

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