Oldham’s Green Heart: Play at the Centre, Oldham for Oldham Council with Timberplay Ltd.

Oldham’s Green Heart: Play at the Centre, Oldham for Oldham Council with Timberplay Ltd.

 

Oldham Council has spent a decade placing play at the heart of its parks and town centre, ensuring children can access nature and high-quality play. Through financial challenges and periods of transition their commitment to a consistent vision has remained: to create a town where play is central to community life. This approach now shapes a landmark town centre development where the former Market Hall site is being transformed into a new urban park, a green heart prioritising nature, play and a welcoming civic landscape.

 

 

Describe the context of this project and its neighbourhood and people. 

 

Oldham is a proud and resilient borough at the heart of Greater Manchester, rich in heritage, culture and community spirit. Confronting challenges of deprivation and unemployment Oldham Council has consistently used design and placemaking as catalysts for positive change, with play as the thread connecting wellbeing, nature and community life.
 
In partnership with Timberplay, the Council has spent more than a decade embedding play within its parks and public spaces, evolving towards a landscape-led, child-determined and climate-resilient approach. This collaboration has supported a cultural shift within the authority from cautious management to confident advocacy for natural play, risk and challenge. Through shared learning, study visits and ongoing dialogue maintenance teams and officers have embraced the value of natural materials and play environments that invite curiosity and resilience.
 
These principles have transformed parks across the borough, establishing a strong design language rooted in sustainability and social connection. The success of this approach has laid the foundation for Oldham’s most ambitious step yet; moving beyond the existing high-street play area to create an entirely new town centre park, embedding nature and play into the urban environment in a way the town has never seen before.
 
Drawing on lessons from the parks, the new public realm celebrates natural play, climate-conscious design and inclusive civic space, creating a town centre that’s putting children and communities at its heart.

 

Tell us what you did and how it created a child-friendly place. For example, how does it support the rights of the child to rest, relax, play and to take part in cultural and creative activities in a safe and clean environment?

 

Oldham Council has embedded play as a core principle of placemaking, not an afterthought but the starting point for design. Having established natural play as a hallmark of its parks and open spaces the Council is now placing child-friendly design at the heart of town centre regeneration, recognising that places thrive when children feel welcome, safe and inspired to play.
 
Central to this transformation is a new urban park, created by removing the former Market Hall to make space for nature, play and social connection. With housing and new development to follow, Oldham has prioritised a civic landscape where families can meet and feel ownership of their town centre. Guided by sustainability and inclusivity the park includes climate-resilient planting, blue-green infrastructure and sensory-rich natural play. Working with Timberplay, the Council has supported a cultural shift across departments, embedding positive risk management and a shared understanding of the long-term social and environmental value of play. When a well-used play space had to be removed for construction, senior leadership safeguarded childrens' rights by commissioning a temporary replacement, ensuring families continued to have safe and accessible opportunities to relax and play. Once works are complete this temporary facility will move to strengthen provision elsewhere, demonstrating a consistent commitment to children even within tight spatial and financial constraints. The project contributes to a wider “green ribbon” of routes, pocket parks, orchards and growing spaces - a visible commitment to children’s right to play in an environment that promotes wellbeing, nature connection and social interaction.

How did the project make a positive social and environmental contribution in the context of child health childhood and wellbeing? If this was a temporary intervention, is there a legacy plan? 

 

Oldham’s approach places nature, climate resilience and children’s wellbeing at the centre of regeneration. By creating a network of green and playable public spaces, and now introducing a major town centre park, the Council is providing safe and imaginative environments for everyday childhood experiences. 
 
These spaces support active lifestyles, freedom of movement and access to nature for families who often lack private outdoor space, particularly in surrounding high-density neighbourhoods. Environmental sustainability underpins design decisions. The new town centre park integrates blue-green infrastructure to manage water, enhance biodiversity and moderate urban heat. This environmental strategy also functions as a health intervention: children experience the physical and emotional benefits of natural landscapes while learning to navigate healthy challenge and risk. Socially, the programme has strengthened community cohesion. Parks have become daily meeting places where families stay longer and mix more freely, rebuilding trust in public space. The Council’s work with Timberplay, Planit, and other partners has also transformed internal culture, equipping maintenance teams, play officers and wider departments with the confidence to support natural play, manage risk positively and champion children’s needs through new development. Together, these outcomes show how child-friendly, climate-conscious design can improve health, strengthen communities and reshape the town centre into a place where families genuinely want to be. This work forms part of a wider legacy that includes the growth of Northern Roots, a major green-space partnership creating a regional destination for nature based and child-friendly experiences, further strengthening social cohesion and future legacy for children and families.