Lower Itchen restoration - a proposal for the city.

Together with Friends of the Itchen Estuary supported by the Maritime Volunteer Service, Southampton National Park City (SNPC) set about mapping the riverbank to spot opportunities for interventions that would encourage biodiversity.

Drawing upon local knowledge of the history of the Itchen navigation and the expertise of our trustee and Senior Conservationist Zeno Wijtten as well as a report by ecologist David Fairlamb of Natural Links, they have drawn together a proposal for Southampton City Council's call for sites where there is potential for biodiversity to be increased.​

Download the report here

Image of the boat journey in the Lower Itchen, mapping areas where nature interventions could take place.

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In 2022 SNPC put out a public consultation on priorities for their work, and the top priority identified was to work towards a clean River. Since then, Friends of the Itchen Estuary and Southampton River Rights movement have sprung up - the former to promote citizen science led campaigning and the latter to work towards a collaborative charter for the Rights of Southampton's Rivers.

Image of the Bristol Harbour floating ecosystem, where wetland plants are rooted in a floating biomatrix

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In 2025, one of the ecology officers at Southampton City Council mentioned a project in Bristol harbour where floating ecosystems have been installed, and this provided the inspiration for imagining the River Itchen and her potential to be something other than a boat navigation strip or industrial waste dump.

There are a lot of organisations focussed on interventions for nature along the Itchen, but none downstream of Woodmill. According to the chief ecologist for the Council, she had had to turn down funding for biodiversity net gain in this area because there were no worked up proposals.

As well as submission to the Local Plan, the document has gone to the HIWWT, the Wessex Rivers Trust, ABP and Southern Water Services. There is money for net zero and for biodiversity net gain that can be accessed through development contributions. The tide is turning as evidenced by the SCC motion on rights of rivers. This proposal aims to take the proactive measure of submitting a plan directly to decisions makers - follow Southampton National Park City and the Southampton River Rights website for reporting on any progress.