I’ve just been looking at the CCW’s latest praiseworthy initiative for Accessible Natural Greenspace, flagging up the need for everyone, even city dwellers, to have ‘natural’ green areas within a reasonably accessible distance. Like most initiatives in Wales, however, it is based on a model originating in England, to address English problems.

The English are predominantly city dwellers – 58% of them live in cities of 100,000 people or more; only 18% in small towns of 5-50,000. Wales is a very different country. Only 24% of us live in urban entities with more than 100,000 people – the three relatively small coastal cities of Swansea, Cardiff and Newport. The typical Welsh person, by contrast, lives in a small town or village.

In other words, three quarters of the population of Wales are already much closer to the countryside – literally – than the majority of the population of England, or indeed most European countries. We should exploit this fact to see if we can produce something unique to Wales and perhaps produce a model for others to follow for a change.

CCW’s Consultative Plan for the Eastern Valleys area. This is a provisional map of open country and common land and does not imply public right of access to land at present. It does, however, show how extensive the countryside is around the upper valley communities. Map based on Ordnance Survey 1:25,000 and 1:50,000 maps. Crown Copyright. All rights reserved. Countryside Council for Wales GD272825G 2001

CPRW regrets that for technical reasons the quality of this image is below the normal standard for their website

I have been arguing for some time now that there is in effect a ‘city’ of substantial proportions in the Valleys of South Wales that nobody seems to have noticed and that, if the area was planned as a city, it could perhaps acquire some of the facilities, dynamism and investment that usually characterises more conventional cities of that size elsewhere. The Valleys, which after all, have a population bigger than Glasgow, could then perhaps begin to generate the level of economic prosperity enjoyed by South Wales’ coastal cities.

This vision of a ‘City of the Valleys’ is far more, however, than the closing of the economic gap between the coalfield and the rest of the country. It is nothing less than the creation of a new kind of 21st century living space, the inhabitants of which would enjoy both the urban facilities of a major metropolis and the environment of an accessible countryside, where the intimate familiarity of close knit village communities will coincide with a pride in being part of a ‘green city’ that is neither urban nor rural but exhibits the best of both environments.

A recent Rowntree Trust report stated that at present many Valley communities have the worst of both worlds, with the problems of urban decay compounded by rural isolation, but it’s about time we looked at the Valleys in terms of their potential rather than their problems.

The Valleys could, if the ‘City of the Valleys’ strategy were implemented, become a better place to live than most of Britain’s long-established urban conurbations and enjoy the best of both worlds - all the facilities of a major city - but instead of the monotonous sea of rooftops which characterises the conventional city, there could be the spectacular and accessible scenery of mountainside, woodland and country parks reclaimed from the former colliery wastelands. One of the Valleys’ most important assets - perhaps its ‘Unique Selling Point’ - is the presence of large areas of accessible countryside, much of it common land, in between the urban areas along the mountain ridges. Most of the City of the Valleys is in fact countryside, although very little is farmed intensively. A substantial number of country parks have been created over the past twenty years, mostly as a result of large scale colliery reclamation schemes, and these are being connected by a developing network of cyclepaths. In these areas the emphasis is increasingly shifting towards biodiversity rather than traditional agriculture.

The presence of thousands of hectares of common land and country parks, connected by a network of cyclepaths and footpaths, holds out the opportunity of creating a unique, polycentric, regional Park in the Valleys under public management and accessible to all. The extent of the Park would be defined by the land where the public have unrestricted right of access, unlike the British national parks in which most of the land is privately owned and access is often restricted. As it happens the industrial and pre-industrial heritage of the area is extensive and the numerous historic and prehistoric remains scattered throughout the former coalfield add points of interest in an often spectacular landscape setting.

In an area such as the Valleys, where household incomes and levels of health and fitness are very low, extensive areas of free recreational amenities have an obvious potential benefit to local people. The economic potential is enormous, as a Valleys Regional Park would have a tourism appeal far greater than the individual parks and cycleways could ever have on their own. This in turn would underpin environmental benefits as the creation and maintenance of biodiversity could be seen to have direct economic benefits. Above all, it would transform the image of the Valleys, and to some extent Wales as a whole, which is still stuck with a negative perception of a grimy industrial landscape to many outsiders.

I believe that such a park could be established at relatively little cost (most of the component parts are already in existence). A feasibility study is inevitably needed, following which a conference of all interested parties could be convened. A small permanent co-ordinating secretariat would need to be set up to ensure that all of the relevant organisations in the regional park area were working towards the same overall objective until ultimately, a park authority could be established to manage the resource.

I also believe that there is a huge untapped demand for this sort of park, where extensive and accessible countryside is interwoven with urban areas where pubs, toilets, shops and other amenities are also readily accessible. The rugged hikers will no doubt continue to prefer the wild open spaces of our national parks but for very many people the prospect of exploring spectacular countryside but with safe urban comforts also available nearby, will have immense appeal. Four pioneering local authorities in the area have now banded together with the WDA and the Brecon Beacons National Park to commission a study to see if such an approach to planning the sub-region might pay off. Watch this space.