THE winner of a competition to design a new greenway and park has been announced.

The park is set to form the centrepiece of St Cuthbert’s Garden Village community in Carlisle, the largest project of its kind in the north of England.

Gillespies, The Greenway Ribbon is the winner of the 'Start with the Park: St Cuthbert's Garden Village Competition'.

Carlisle City Council, in partnership with the Landscape Institute, launched the two-stage design competition in 2021 and received 13 professional entries.

A spokesperson from Carlisle City Council said: "'Start with the Park’ - to be based near Durdar and Blackwell - is an opportunity to create a resource that could be a visitor destination attraction in its own right and will benefit the existing and future residents of Carlisle.

"By establishing the ‘Greenway’ at the outset of SCGV, a greenspace will be created at the heart of the community and will be a unique selling point.

"It will also connect the proposed new communities with each other, with existing villages in the area, with the city, and with the surrounding countryside.

"The Greenway also provides an opportunity to look at new ways of delivering cycling and walking infrastructure in Carlisle to encourage recreational and active travel.

"A key element of this will be ensuring that this connectivity is both within and beyond the garden village - in particular ensuring active/sustainable transport connectivity to the city centre and the transformational regeneration projects within the southern gateway area such as the railway station improvements, new university campus and business space at the Citadels and Caldew Riverside."

The competition, developed by the council, partnered with The Landscape Institute, and United Utilities as main sponsors, launched on Monday July 12, 2021, and was open to both professionals and students across a range of disciplines.

The professional competition followed a two-stage process.

Each of the three entrants selected to progress to stage 2 of the competition were awarded an honorarium of £5,000.

The overall winner received £10,000.

The Greenway, ‘Start with a Park’ project is identified in the Carlisle Town Deal Investment Plan, alongside six other schemes.

Carlisle submitted the Investment Plan to government in October 2020 and received a Heads of Terms offer for £19.7million of investment for the city in March 2021.