Construction begins on new Learning Centre at Lunt Meadows

After many years of planning, the construction of a brand-new Learning Centre is finally underway at Lunt Meadows Nature Reserve in Sefton, Merseyside.

Lunt Meadows is popular with visitors and one of the Lancashire Wildlife Trust’s more unusual reserves. It is a haven for rare wetland wildlife, contains remains of 9000-year-old middle stone age settlements, and the whole site has been designed to function as a flood storage reservoir in times of extreme weather, protecting homes within the Alt-Crossens catchment from a changing climate.

A timber cabin design, the Learning Centre will bring much-needed facilities to Lunt Meadows, with;

a classroom,
toilets,
seating area,
kitchen,
and a volunteer room.
This Learning Centre has taken many years of planning. Feedback from visitors and volunteers has often included the desire for toilets and shelter on site. Lunt is a beautiful place with vast open skies, but this also means it is at the mercy of the weather.

Cheryl Ashton, Project Manager for Lunt Meadows, says:

With a building on site, we can make visits more comfortable for all and increase our staff presence, which in turn will allow us to improve our engagement and conservation work, while keeping an eye on the wildlife’s wellbeing.
       
A lot of thought has gone into the design of the Learning Centre. The cabin has been manufactured in Carnforth by a UK company, delivered in sections and is being constructed by a local workforce.

On arrival, these sections are fitted together. An air source heat pump will generate underfloor heating. Some of the furniture and kitchen cabinets will be crafted from wood processed at the Mere Sands Wood’s Reserve.
Wildflowers and reeds will be planted around the Centre too, to create more space for wildlife and give visitors a small taster of the wider species within the rest of the reserve.

Planning and construction of the Learning Centre has faced many obstacles since the development of the idea, so we are thrilled that work has finally started.

The new centre is part of a wider programme of works to improve the visitor experience and habitats at Lunt Meadows, supported by the National Lottery Heritage Fund. The Presenting Mesolithic and Modern Life Project aims give visitors and the extended community an understanding of how humans have interacted with the landscape over thousands of years, how landscape changes affect human lives and how these choices influence our future. It is a 5-year long partnership between Lancashire Wildlife Trust, the Museum of Liverpool, the Dept. of History and Archaeology, University of Chester, and Soroptimist International Crosby.

The project start date was delayed until December 2020 by Covid when many of our staff were furloughed, and we were further hampered by a catastrophic flood in January 2021, when the river Alt embankment collapsed, and the site had to close for months while repairs took place. Like many others, we have also been dealing with spiralling costs and material shortages in the construction industry. We applied for further funding and worked with our suppliers to adapt the Centre’s design to be as cost-effective as possible, but as we would make up one shortfall, the costs would go up again.