Creating a legacy for habitat at Monks Brook
Winning the Large Scale Permanent Award in the 2015 BIG Biodiversity Challenge with – installation of Pool and Run Habitats at M27 Junction 5, close to Southampton, really meant a lot to all of us at Interserve. We were proud to receive such a prestigious accolade recognising our continuing commitment to biodiversity.
Our in-house SustainAbilities programme, which champions innovative approaches to sustainable best practice, also recognised our work on this scheme at Monks Brook with an Interserve award. So our team had a great year!
The project, which involved the widening of access roads to an existing roundabout from the M27 and three busy local roads, provided us with an opportunity to go beyond basic mitigation measures in our delivery of the project. We were able to create a lasting legacy of habitat improvements – helping enhance the local river ecology and support brown and migratory sea trout populations. We created a diverse and vibrant section of semi-natural river so fish had a safe refuge and an ideal spawning environment.
Not only did the trout benefit from our works, the importance of environment protection was vividly brought to life for everyone involved in the project. Some of our team are interested in fishing and others like to take their children or grandchildren to look for fish in the local stream. The environmental improvements to Monks Brook provided them with a tangible illustration of how our industry and their behaviour directly influences these everyday pleasures and pursuits.
It really made our team recognise the influence they have and how we all share responsibility for the future ecology of our water courses. Transforming Monks Brook really did bring better to life - one of Interserve’s core values - for everyone involved in this project and the recognition of what our team achieved through a BIG Award was the icing on the cake. It has given us real encouragement to move forward with our ongoing commitment to biodiversity through our SustainAbilities programme.
Linda Wilkinson, Environmental Adviser, Interserve