Following a three-week leaving a legacy transformational project we are thrilled to announce the successful completion of our first transformational project at Sunnyside Rural Trust, a Hertfordshire-based charity and social enterprise. Over the course of three weeks in October 2024, we transformed the Northchurch facility’s car park into a safer, more accessible space, creating a lasting impact for the community.
At Octavius, we are committed to leaving a sustainable and positive legacy wherever we work, helping to improve communities beyond the infrastructure we create. So, this year, we launched a series of themed social activities and transformational projects to bring together our employees, customers, charities, and supply chain partners to make a lasting impact and contribute to a cleaner environment. We’re proud that in collaboration with several partners we were able to successfully plan and complete this community project in just 10 months.
- 55 mentoring hours.
- 10 months in the making!
- 12 organisations involved – Some giving donations and/or staff volunteering hours.
- £17k materials donated.
- Three- weeks onsite to complete the project.
- 228 staff volunteering hours completed.
- 696 professional services hours.
Bringing a community dream to life
Sunnyside Rural Trust provides training and employment opportunities to over 170 young people and adults with learning disabilities across three sites: Hemel Hempstead Food Garden, Berkhamsted Activity Centre, and Northchurch. Their mission is to build self-esteem, teach valuable skills, and foster independence.
Earlier this year, our framework manager, Jon Millar, began mentoring Lewis, a support worker at Sunnyside, on project management. Lewis shared his vision of transforming the Northchurch car park into a safer, more accessible space for visitors. This dream became a reality thanks to the collaborative efforts of Octavius, our partners, and grant funding from Cllr Terry Douris.
The car park had previously been uneven, lacked allocated spaces, and featured wasted areas due to inconsistent surfacing. These challenges created difficulties for those with poor mobility and limited the functionality of the space. The transformation involved many different groups of people coming together from volunteering their time, donating materials, planning the project, providing machinery and much more. The three-week project included renewing the groundworks to improve foundational issues and involve creating willow dens, planting, moving compost, digging and much more. The transformed car park now boasts safe, allocated parking spaces to improve accessibility for all visitors, maximised utilisation of space to better support Sunnyside’s operations and enhanced infrastructure that enables Sunnyside to expand their farm shop, host school visits, and raise awareness about their services.
Octavius has proudly supported Sunnyside Rural Trust for the past eight years. This transformational project is a testament to our shared commitment to fostering sustainable and meaningful change. We’re thrilled we were able to lead this project and bring their dream to life. We look forward to continuing our journey of creating community-driven solutions that leave a lasting legacy and supporting Sunnyside as they expand their support and services to local people.
This project’s success would not have been possible without the incredible support of our partners and customers. Thank you to Hertfordshire County Council, Meehan for labour and machinery, L Lynch for plant hire, Connect Plus, Fortel Group, Hertfordshire Plant Hire, Watford Plant & Grab Hire, Breedon Special Aggregates. Also, staff at Sunnyside including Matt Felix, Paula Horsnell, Lewis Sinfield and trainees.
Also, a huge thank you everyone across our Octavius team who brought this project to life. From planning to execution, your dedication and teamwork has been truly inspiring. A special thank you to Jon Millar, Sarah O’Mahoney, Dean Donnelly, Andy Williams and our Hertfordshire Framework team for embodying our values and bringing our commitment to leaving a lasting legacy to life,
