Nature Towns and Cities Belfast

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Nature Towns and Cities (NTC) is a UK-wide programme that seeks to help put nature at the heart of local decision making for everyone’s benefit. Belfast is part of this initiative, backed by £850,514 from The National Lottery Heritage Fund (link opens in new window).

Our NTC project, Breaking Through Barriers to Connect People and Nature is being delivered in partnership with Ulster Wildlife until July 2028. Together, we want to work to make Belfast's urban spaces greener, improve community connections, and help the city adapt to climate change.

This is a collaborative project to figure out our current situation, our future goals, and how to reach them. It will not fund construction work like building new parks. Instead, it focuses on training, upskilling, and building partnerships.

The project has six main areas of work:

  • Supporting Community Action: Working with local people to build skills and capacity to get involved
  • Approaches to Greening the Grey: How can we support and connect nature when we turn the grey into green
  • Nature and Climate support: Learn how our parks and open spaces can be managed to support to better support biodiversity and climate resilience
  • Data led thinking: Assess the data we have available to make smart decisions.
  • Ongoing sustainability: Investigating funding opportunities and methods to sustain ongoing and future work
  • Getting ready for Biodiversity Net Gain: how could we implement this approach to planning when it comes to Northern Ireland

You can find out about about the wider programme on the Nature Towns and Cities website (link opens in new window).

Get involved

This is about connecting people and nature. So we need your help!

We've created this page to make it easier for residents, community groups and organisations from across Belfast to get involved and have their say. From here you can:

  • Share your ideas or take part in surveys
  • Find out about upcoming events
  • sign up to our emails to stay up to date with our Nature Towns and Cities project




Nature Towns and Cities (NTC) is a UK-wide programme that seeks to help put nature at the heart of local decision making for everyone’s benefit. Belfast is part of this initiative, backed by £850,514 from The National Lottery Heritage Fund (link opens in new window).

Our NTC project, Breaking Through Barriers to Connect People and Nature is being delivered in partnership with Ulster Wildlife until July 2028. Together, we want to work to make Belfast's urban spaces greener, improve community connections, and help the city adapt to climate change.

This is a collaborative project to figure out our current situation, our future goals, and how to reach them. It will not fund construction work like building new parks. Instead, it focuses on training, upskilling, and building partnerships.

The project has six main areas of work:

  • Supporting Community Action: Working with local people to build skills and capacity to get involved
  • Approaches to Greening the Grey: How can we support and connect nature when we turn the grey into green
  • Nature and Climate support: Learn how our parks and open spaces can be managed to support to better support biodiversity and climate resilience
  • Data led thinking: Assess the data we have available to make smart decisions.
  • Ongoing sustainability: Investigating funding opportunities and methods to sustain ongoing and future work
  • Getting ready for Biodiversity Net Gain: how could we implement this approach to planning when it comes to Northern Ireland

You can find out about about the wider programme on the Nature Towns and Cities website (link opens in new window).

Get involved

This is about connecting people and nature. So we need your help!

We've created this page to make it easier for residents, community groups and organisations from across Belfast to get involved and have their say. From here you can:

  • Share your ideas or take part in surveys
  • Find out about upcoming events
  • sign up to our emails to stay up to date with our Nature Towns and Cities project




  • CLOSED: This survey has concluded.

    Fill in our short survey to help us understand what 'nature' means to people. You can also share your ideas for how we could better connect people to nature.

    Share Your views on connecting people with nature on Facebook Share Your views on connecting people with nature on X (formerly Twitter) Share Your views on connecting people with nature on Linkedin Email Your views on connecting people with nature link
Page last updated: 21 Oct 2026, 04:02 PM