Milestone has been involved with the ‘David Bellamy Conservation Award’ for several years now and is very proud to have been awarded the Gold award yet again for 2019/20. We are always keen to take on board all suggestions that people have for our site that will benefit the environment and to keep pushing for environmental greatness.

Since the David Bellamy Conservation Award began it has helped to bring conservation to the front of the tourism industry’s mind. The Award has helped people wake up to the fact that “We need to act now to save tomorrow”.

This award is made each year to parks which can demonstrate policies showing active concern for the environment. Assisted by local nature groups and holidaymakers themselves, David Bellamy looks at virtually every aspect of park management – from the protection of plant and animal habitats to the efficient use of energy and recycling. Helping visitors to understand conservation is also considered a qualifying feature.

All year round we work in partnership with the Nottinghamshire Wildlife Trust to try and change things for the better. One of the first things that we did was to introduce silver recycling bins to reduce the amount of recyclable waste that was simply being thrown away. This was very popular and thanks to our customers, we managed to reduce our waste by a third in the first year, and by the second year we had introduced another five bins to our existing ten in a bid to reduce it even more.

We have also recently replaced most of our lights in our shower blocks from ordinary lights to LED lights that use a lot less power but still give off more light, which is a very big saving and is proving very effective. We have also installed sensors in both toilet blocks and showers, thus reducing the amount of power being used.

Most recently we were awarded the British Beekeepers Association Honey Bee Friendly Park 2019/20, this is the parks commitment to doing what we can to provide forage plants that bees need, to provide homes for bees and to spread the word about bee conservation.