Kestrel Park fully reopens after two-year restoration of its lake and woodland

The last construction fences came down at Kestrel Park this week, ending a two-year restoration that at times closed more than half of the city's largest green space. By mid-morning on the first full day, joggers were back on the lakeside path and a queue had formed outside the new café by the old bandstand.

The biggest single job was underwater. Contractors removed around 18,000 cubic metres of silt from the boating lake, which had shrunk to less than a metre deep in places and turned green most summers. The spoil was dried on site and used to shape a low mound at the northern end, now planted with wildflowers.

Six hundred new trees

Across the park, 600 trees have gone in, mostly oak, field maple and wild cherry, chosen to replace ageing horse chestnuts lost to disease. A large share were planted by volunteers. The Friends of Kestrel Park logged more than 4,000 volunteer hours over the two years, according to its coordinator, Moira Sandhu.

People kept turning up in the rain with their own spades, which told us this park matters more than any survey could.

The new play area, built on the site of a disused tennis court, includes a timber climbing frame, a sand and water zone and a roundabout that can take a wheelchair. Kieran Walsh, a father of two from Millbrook who was there with his daughters, said it was the first time in months they had not driven across town to find swings.

• Total cost: €7.4m, shared between the council and a heritage lottery grant

• Lake depth restored to 2.2 metres

• Café run by a local social enterprise

Wildlife has already returned faster than expected. Rangers have counted kingfishers on the lake for the first time in years, and a family of great crested grebes nested on the new reed island at the western end. Bat surveys carried out before the old trees were felled led to 40 bat boxes being fixed to mature oaks around the edge of the park, and early checks suggest most of them are now in use.

Rangers say the lake will take a season or two to settle, and some paths will be closed briefly while young trees are staked. Boating returns next spring. The park's athletics track, which stayed open throughout the work, is unaffected.