Benches chosen by the public have been placed in St Neots Riverside Park and Priory Park, following the announcement of Beacon Wealth Group's gift to the local community.
Back in January, the Beacon Wealth Group announced their plans for placing a special bench in Riverside Park to celebrate the local community’s unity, to say 'thank you' and show their support to those affected during these unprecedented times, alongside a Wildflower Pictorial Meadow, covering approximately 540m2 which they would also be paying for.
Following this announcement, Beacon Wealth Group asked the public to choose the design of the bench via a public pole on social media. The winning design pictured below won with 66.7% of the vote.
Following the success of Beacon’s public vote the Council decided to order more of these benches and have started situating them around Priory Park and St Neots Riverside Park.
Molly Ward, Open Spaces Officer said: “We really liked Beacon’s idea of being able to provide the public a special place to rest and reflect after this past year and a half, and decided to continue this throughout our local parks. We love that the local community have themselves chosen the design and are enjoying watching them being out in the open spaces using them.”
Tony Larkins, Beacons Managing Director said: “The pandemic has been hard on everyone, in many different ways, and if this can bring a little bit of light to a dark situation then it will have been worth it.”
The new bench that started this movement looks slightly different to the others as it features a blue butterfly and a special plaque which reads ‘This bench has been placed here by Beacon Wealth Group to symbolise the strength in our community during the Covid-19 pandemic.’
There has been a lot of work taking place at this particular area of the Riverside Park and the large Wildflower Pictorial Meadow is due to be seeded and in bloom in the coming weeks.
The bench pictured was placed in St Neots Riverside Park on Tuesday June 8, which looks out towards part of the Wildflower Pictorial Meadow and the river.
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