The Charity came about because the City Council had no money to maintain the parks and so turning to consultants the idea farming off the job to a charity which would self-fund the parks maintenance turned from an idea to a reality. In 2019 the Charity was created and received £10m from the Council to start them off, with the cash being delivered in reducing yearly amounts spread over the first 10 years. (See the News 2019 page).

For several reasons the charity struggled. They were given control of all the buildings in the Parks, which were soon found to be in a worse state than expected requiring expenditure to make them safe. Then along came storm Arwen to cause severe damage to trees, all of which required time and money to sort out.

The two cafes, in the Exhibition Park and at Paddy Freemans Park were a real success story but other attempts to raise funds by running festival and events in the parks were quickly curtailed due to noise complaints, The arrival of Covid put the “tin hat” on their fortunes so to speak and the Charity, now renamed Urban Green Newcastle ran out of cash in 2024.

The Council spent yet more money on consultants who this time suggested bring the Parks maintenance back in-house and so in early 2025 that is what happened. All the Urban Green employees were taken into the Council payroll.

Its fair to say that Urban Green had its own difficulties, a revolving door of employees who never seemed to stay long and a permanent drive to have the highest standards of risk assessments, method statements and compliance documentation, something their predecessor, The Parks and Leisure Dept never bothered with. Had they been given longer there is a fair chance they could have made a go of it. Nobody could deny that the Urban Green staff were enthusiastic, and always tried their best for the Parks despite the limitations imposed on them.