Everyone who objected to the plans to build artificial pitches and enclose them behind a 15 foot mesh fence on Tooting Triangle is called on to respond to the council’s comments.
Please check if you have received an email from Common Land Casework and respond by April 19th. You can use any of the arguments below or choose your own.
Send your email to: CommonLandCasework@planninginspectorate.gov.uk
Use the subject line: Proposed Tooting Common works /3263104
Application Scrutiny
As first the arbiter, and then applicant for this development, Wandsworth Borough Council have never provided the required level of independence or scrutiny into this application, or the impact on the public of its change of use.
Importance during winter
This area of the common is vital to the community; it is the only island of dry space in a large area of common which floods for months in winter. It is one of the only spaces in the locality that remains useable for the public during those months, a fact that has been highlighted during the pandemic, where it has been home to every kind of activity from recreation to conversation, keeping fit, and playing sport.
This role as an area of dry, accessible public space in winter with exponentially higher value than that of the land around it has gone unaddressed by the council.
Value as one of the lungs of London
In summer, surrounded by open land and abundant nature, it remains the few remaining tranquil areas in the capital, highly prized for its biodiversity - and a rare space that serves as one of the lungs of London
At a time when parkland is increasing sectioned off, Balkanised, and commercialised through intensive use, this will be an unwarranted intensification, likely to result in the rapid proliferation of similar commercial sites across other parks and commons. (Battersea Park has introduced mini golf, pizza restaurants, climbing etc, while nearby Clapham Common is consistently throughout summer utilised as a music and entertainment venue.)
This consequences of this intensification go unaddressed by the council.
Value to mental health and wellbeing
This area is hidden away from roads, and vital to the mental health of all who seek out a refuge from the competing demands of one of the world’s busiest cities.
The value and natural capital of this open area, both as a vital sanctuary within a pressurized and sprawling urban environment, and in providing for unstructured rest and recreation for the mental health of a busy population, is exponentially greater than simply the square footage available for football.
This has gone unaddressed by the council.
Lack of defined benefit for the wider community
The developer will profit from a 25 long year lease of public land, favouring a paying audience of male sporting customers - despite football being already catered for across a majority of the common. This does not justify the enclosure of this area of the common to the exclusion of others.
If they exist, the requirements for social benefits and the necessity for interaction with the wider community have not been shared with the public, and also absent is any specific terms or conditions. It is possible that these requirements may exist in the proposed lease or service agreement, but despite requests, the details of the agreement itself has not been made public.
The nearest secondary schools have their own artificial pitches and local primary schools have not been officially approached and report that it would be difficult for them to benefit, given the time and organisational restraints of moving and supervising large groups of children.
This has not been addressed by the council.
Provision of play and stay and play for children
With the closure of the 1 o’clock club at the site by the council, the developer’s plans specified the provision of a stay and play area and a soft play area for children - unusually positioned beside the boxing club.
These details have been omitted in the council’s response, whose facilities formed a large part of the effort to convince the public of the wider community benefits of the development at the planning committee stage and to help offset removing an area of common land from public use. There is no clarity and clarification of TFC’s plans for soft play and stay and play and the charges and accessibility, particularly as the available space is very limited,
Why is this omission not explained by the council?
The pandemic and the enclosure of common land
The pandemic has redrawn the boundaries for everyone and highlighted the importance of public space and the local environment.
Public space is precious and should be multi-functional if it is to respond to these new demands and the demands of a fast growing population. The introduction of a locked enclosure behind a 15 foot high, 80 yard long mesh fence is not conducive to maintaining these vital areas of public access.
Intensification of Traffic
The proposed development will mean a huge increase in traffic for the Triangle area, with up to 50 players an hour (plus parents, spectators, officials) using the pitches, all day and evening, 7 days a week, 52 weeks a year.
Almost all similar facilities have a dedicated car parking, however with the council have refused to accept there will be intensification of use, although there were very many complaints from local residents about the impact this will have on surrounding streets, particularly in Lambeth
There has been no consultation. The planner stated that ‘daytime CPZ designations within the location provide a suitable degree of control’. This is untrue. The majority of surrounding streets only have controlled parking between 10am -12 noon Monday to Friday. So outside of these times (and all weekend) users of the development will be able to park freely on nearby residential streets, coming and going every hour until at least 10pm every night of the week.
This will have a huge detrimental impact on the local community and that area of the Triangle. The surrounding streets cannot support this intensification of traffic.
The Green Plan put forward by TFC is unrealistic. Bike racks for 12 bikes when there could be 400 new users a day will not mitigate car use. There will also be traffic backed up along Cavendish Road and side roads including ubers and cabs, to pick up and drop off.
The current users of the Triangle playground are very local. The new users of TFCs development will be coming from all over South London, some further. When parents are rushing to get their child to football practice, then back for homework before school the next day, they are going to use the quickest form of transport – this will primarily be by car. Weekend users will swamp the area with traffic and noise.
Wandsworth are ignoring this inevitable problem that will mainly affect Lambeth residents. They should undertake a full traffic consultation, and acknowledge the intensification of use this development will cause.
A club from semi-professional leagues based at the common
The developer Chris Warren of TFC says his company has “not entered into exclusive arrangements for use of the pitches” - however all evidence is that he will do exactly this.
TFC have been working together for the past five years with Balham FC, a club with circa 26 teams, who play at semi professional level - and have even expressed a wish to build a stadium in Balham. The two groups met in March, 2016 when both were brought together by the council to tender for the site. This cooperation has been confirmed by the club’s secretary, who referred to the new area as a “new training base” for the club in supporting the planning application.
The benefits for BFC is guaranteed training slots with guaranteed block bookings for TFC.
The BFC website from November 2019 even calls the site ‘a new training development’ and says both parties have been “working closely.” https://balhamfc.com/news/new-club-training-development
In a statement, BFC have said: “Our club, like many others, has spoken to the operator about the use of it at an agreed time on two nights a week and for a couple of hours on a weekend.”
Non-specific assurances made by parties who stand to make considerable financial gain do not represent proper protection of public rights of access and enjoyment.
Floodlights, Light Pollution and Biodiversity
Both the December 2019 Lighting Assessment and the March 2019 Daytime Bat Habitiat Assessment did not acknowledge the existing floodlights are rarely used, maximum usage in the past has only been 2-3 hours on Thursday evenings, if at all.
These reports wrongly assume current usage is the same as proposed usage by TFC, estimated to be around 40 hours a week between September – May. An increase of 38 hours floodlighting a week in the winter months!
This increase has been ignored by the developers, the planners, and WBC, but it will have a huge detrimental effect on local wildlife, particularly bats and insects and on the tranquil nature and aspect of this area of the common.
The March 2019 Daytime Bat Assessment was inadequate, and was only valid for one year. It was out of date when planning was granted by WBC in May 2020. It did not acknowledge that the floodlights are only used for 2-3 hours a week or less.
Gov.UK guidance on bats states: ‘Bat activity surveys should be done in the bat active season, May to September.’ This has been ignored by TFC and WBC.
Increasing the use of floodlights and light pollution during the winter months will not only disturb wildlife, it will destroy the unique nature of the whole Tooting Triangle Field, to the detriment of the local community.
Ecology of Tooting Triangle
The proposals to develop the old football pitch site will inevitably have a detrimental effect on the plant life and biodiversity of the area.The Common itself is designated a Site of Importance for Nature Conservation and a Site of Metropolitan Importance, and the Triangle field is one of the least developed areas of the entire common, especially since the old pitch has been left unfenced for decades and nature has taken its course around it.
The designs show that trees, ivy and vegetation will be removed or pollarded,herbicide deployed,trenches dug, and generally great disruption caused to areas specifically noted for foraging birds.
The construction period alone of the scheme will inevitably damage the existing ecology due to machinery and heavy plant and once the scheme is complete,noise,additional lighting and increased busy-ness of the site will continue to degrade the place for natural ecosystems to survive happily.
The applicant seeks to play down the values of the birds and pollinators as not being as important as elsewhere on the common, or because there are no protected birds here and mitigation by planting some new saplings does not replace the value of mature trees for many years either in terms of habitat or carbon sequestration.
Wandsworth Borough Council and a ‘thumb on the scales’ of judgement
Wandsworth Borough Council has consistently acted as chief cheerleader for the development, while failing to ensure any specific protections for public use.
This dual role has led the council to actively pursue the case for this development, first through its offshoot Enable, then as adjudicator and now as applicant, while also claiming to sit in judgement over its wider benefits for the public.
This has led to the council waiving through the proposal at planning stage despite overwhelming public opposition, and then itself applying on behalf of the developer to the Planning Inspectorate.
Its overt bias in favour of revenue raising and against the full and proper protection of common land was made clear when the Chairman of the Council’s Planning Committee failed to divulge his role as a director of Enable - the body, charged with overseeing the development of Wandsworth’s parks and common.
The Public Response
At every stage the public have shown themselves to be informed and engaged, despite a deficit of information from the developer, who only launched a public website two days before the end of two public consultations.
More than 10,000 residents petitioned the council and over 1,000 formally objected with 750 also responding to the Planning Inspectorate.
The council have claimed the public have been misinformed about the development, however at no stage have they acted to provide information on specifics on the the charges, likely users, required social provision, volume of traffic, noise monitoring, or full details of the childcare provision which are fundamental to explaining the public use case. There has been no public consultation with the residents, local community or users of the common by the developer despite claims by Chris Warren to the contrary.
Wandsworth Council is leasing the site out for a period of at least 25 years. But there has been a total lack of clarity and transparency about how the site will be operated and what commitments, if any, there will be as part of any agreement as to access by schools, local families and the public generally, and how those commitments will be enforced over that period. The council should not be allowed to dispose of public land without the public – or the Secretary of State - even being told what has been agreed with the operator.
It is the duty of the Planning Inspectorate to refuse this application. The case for enclosing such an important area of the common and entrusting it to a commercial user for the benefit of one segment of society cannot be proven.