Graham Young explores a Solihull park which looks like new again after a £1million makeover.

Seven of the 28 parks in leafy Solihull have a coveted Keep Britain Tidy green flag – but not the one which you might think of first.

The conjoined Malvern and Brueton parks have a flag between them and there are more flying over parks called Shirley, Elmdon, Knowle, Dorridge, Lavender Hall and Meriden.

Missing in action – though surely not for much longer – is Tudor Grange, just a stone’s throw from the Touchwood Shopping Centre.

Five years ago, this park was looking ragged around the edges. It was the runt of the borough’s jewels and not immune to litter.

Two centuries ago the land was part of Garret’s Green Farm in Whitefields Road.

Tudor Grange Hall, now part of the Solihull College Blossomfield Campus, was built in 1886. Alfred Frederick Bird, director of Birmingham’s famous custard company, lived there until 1922 and his widow until 1943. After being used by the Red Cross during the Second World War, Solihull’s council bought the land in 1946 and opened the park some 60 years ago.

Its more recently fading fortunes began to change in January 2008 when the Tudor Grange Leisure Centre opened close to Blossomfield Road.

Land previously beneath the demolished 1960s Norman Green Sports Centre was reseeded only last month as part of the park’s wider £1 million revamp.

The results are stunning because the mature Tudor Grange park of old suddenly also looks brand new.

Solihull’s head park ranger, Tracey Churchard, is thrilled and the restoration of Tudor Grange is a real highlight of her 14 years’ work with the council.

Whereas Handsworth Park was recently restored to its Victorian standards at a cost of almost £10 million, Solihull’s parks are all too young to qualify for similar heritage funding, making Tudor Grange’s transformation all the more impressive.

The park gleams with stainless steel benches, litter bins and signposts, new pathways, fresh borders and beautiful, semi-mature native trees, clearly in rude health.

There’s also pitch and putt, a BMX woodland site, skateboarding park and outdoor gym equipment.

Funded with a £400,000 grant from Sport England’s Community Club Development Programme, a 1km figure-of-eight cycling circuit was devised by Solihull Cycling Club’s Olympic Silver medallist Harry Reynolds.

“The park has now got something for everyone,” says Tracey. “And, with a 10,000 capacity, Tudor Grange will now be Solihull’s main events park for things like firework displays. It’s close to Touchwood and the bus and railway stations and has parking available all the way round.”

So what next for Tracey’s team?

“Our job is to look after all of the parks and we visit the major ones every day and the others at least once a week,” she says. “We go into schools, too, but not as often as we would like because there are some children in Chelmsley Wood who never get out into open spaces.

“We have a network of park users who call us if they see anything because we can’t be everywhere.

“Although we’d love to spend money in different parks, how can you decide between that and a need for housing, etc?

“But because of Shirley’s Parkgate development, there will be money from that for Shirley Park.”

Over at Tudor Grange, the bar of affordable achievement has been raised to new heights, not just in Solihull, but across the West Midlands as a whole.

* Tudor Grange Leisure Centre is at Blossomfield Road, Solihull B91 1NB, telephone 0121 705 6371, website www.leisurecentre.com For more information about parks with green flags, visit www.keepbritaintidy.org