New welcome sign instaled at Beacon Hill Conversation Park, part of Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust nature reserves’s to celebrate 20 years of being open to the public by British Gypsum, now part of Saint-Gobain

A new welcome sign to celebrate 20 years of a conversation park being open to the public has been installed.

Beacon Hill Conversation Park is one of the Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust’s 43 nature reserves across the district.

The park was donated to the Trust in 2001 by British Gypsum, now part of Saint-Gobain, which has helped maintain the reserve through employee volunteering and donating new benches for the public to use.

Adam Garbutt, mine technical engineer at Saint-Gobain Formula’s Bantycock Quarry near Newark said: “Saint-Gobain has enjoyed a positive working partnership with Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust for many years and it is a pleasure to celebrate this Beacon Hill anniversary in such a practical way. We hope many people continue to come and enjoy this haven for nature in Nottinghamshire.”

The area was originally owned and mined for gypsum by British Gypsum in the first of part of the last century.

Newark Town Council and Nottinghamshire County Council later used the excavations as a landfill site.

When the land filling operations were complete, the site was sold and transformed into the Industrial Estate which is adjacent to the reserve.

Following discussions between British Gypsum, Newark and Sherwood District Council and the Trust, plans to create the Beacon Hill Conservation Park were agreed and the land was transferred to the Trust on 3 May 2001.

Wayne Ball, the Trust’s head of Nature Recovery said: “Beacon Hill Park is a great place for wildlife and local people and 20 years on from it first being open to the public, the new sign supported by Saint-Gobain will mean more people will be aware that it is open as a place for people to connect with nature on their doorstep.”