Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Felling of ancient trees planned in Ally Pally Park
This from Anastasia Christofis in our inbox this evening:
Two old oak trees in Alexandra Park are destined for the chop (see pics). The one in The Grove has a diameter of 4-5 feet. This tree was one of the boundary markers of The Grove Estate in the 18th century with Tottenham Wood. I don’t know the time scale of this.
Apparently there has been a tree survey done but no one has seen it as it has not been made public.
The Park Manager/Planners, I am told (on the grapevine) have apparently nodded it through on the basis of this survey without any further planning application/consultations/wider consent as is now becoming common practice in the Grove Historic gardens and other areas of the Palace (as you know, it is Conservation Area, subject to Local and National Legislative frameworks with regard to Conservation/Biodiversity, amongst other things and on the Charity Trust land with buildings of the People of London and of interest to me and others as such, so much so in fact some people are up in arms about it already, amongst other things, which is how I have got wind of it).
BBC’s Springwatch scientists recently found rare protected beetles nesting and rare fungi in Alexandra Park which like to live in old ancient woodland trees and decayed wood.
More importantly, can you please help me to find out more about who in this Borough is responsible for safeguarding/protecting these trees and where to obtain copy of this Tree Survey
The Stag Beetles are not the only rare species to be found nesting amongst the rare Bolitius Fungus at Alexandra Palace. There are many other rare species that are reliant and a part of the biodiversity of this area and as a rare old bird, like many of you, I consider myself to be one of them, though no less unconsidered in the past than the recently rediscovered varieties.
I would like to be reassured that our oxygen levels will not be further diminished in this area of poor air quality (Haringey) by the unnecessary culling of trees.
Can somebody get back to me on this and help to put a stop to it in principle (genuine safety considerations excepted, like if a tree is actually caught or threatening vandalism in the park or GBH/ABH, for example) and hopefully copy of the Tree Survey should confirm this.
Those of you interested in this story may also be interested in the Tree Trust for Haringey.
Tags for Forum Posts: alexandra park, parks, trees
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton on
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Apologies if I misconstrued what you said, Clive. Though: “there’s no money in parks” is ambiguous.
It’s also incorrect. Outside the gates of Eden, there’s no such thing as a free lunch or a free park. Someone has to pay. Which means there is money in parks. Both public and private.
As you say, money is spent on parks. It’s spent by our Council from local and national taxes, and grants such as the Lottery. But of course parks and public gardens and sports fields can and do generate an income.
They may have cafés and pubs. And galleries. Many rent pitches and sports courts to clubs and to individuals. Alexandra Park has an After School club. Some use car-parking to make substantial income. Kew Gardens charges an entrance fee.
Then there’s commercial sponsorship. Like small discreet signs on roundabouts and flowerbeds; and some a bit larger. People on HoL have wrestled with this issue when discussing the proposal to lease-off a chunk of Finsbury Park to a commercial business for Five-a-side pitches – with carparking, of course.
To clarify the case of Down Lane, yes, the council's proposal was to build on part of the Park. But the idea was for a land swap. Building on land at the southern end of the park was supposed to be matched – square metre for square metre – by new parkland at the northern end.
Cllr Claire Kober came to the Friends of Down Lane Park (FDLP) meeting and was quite sincere in this proposal. Unfortunately, Claire and other “cabinet” members were misinformed. Officers had included a chunk of green space inside the proposed new housing and commercial development and counted it as ‘park’.
I went with Seamus Carey (Co-ordinator of FDLP) to the Planning Office and confirmed this on their GIS system. (We’d already worked it out for ourselves with the plans and some help from Google Earth aerial photos.)
You invite me to offer evidence disproving your (unevidenced) assertion that: “the council sees parks as just a cost because they produce no income. There is accordingly, no powerful advocacy for parks within the council.”
How many of the 57 councillors would we need to ask? How many of the several thousand staff? Would the successful Green Flag programme have happened without advocacy by councillors and officers? Do you think Cllr Reg Rice (Chair of FDLP), or former councillors Sheik Thompson and Seamus Carey, or me, would have publicly opposed the proposal for Down Lane Park if we'd have seen "just a cost"?
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Permalink Reply by Clive Carter on
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Alan sorry, 'no money in parks' was ambiguous but it wasn't deliberate. I think a further clarification is in order: I mean, parks in their normal, natural state. Parks, as they were originally intended: one of the reasons for Victorian public parks in the first place was as a refuge from the noise and pressures of the commerical world, was it not?
I am all too aware that the council has been trying, to the extent possible, to milk parks for some time. Some of the money-making schemes make parks less park-like, or deny parts of parks to non-paying park-users.
I believe that some years ago the council struck a multi-year deal with The Mean Fiddler to regularly fence off large chunks of Finsbury Park for private profit. As with many property deals the council does with the private sector, the public came off a poor second in terms of cash raised (was it £30k for five years)?. One friend in marketing suggested that the lessee might recoup a whole season's rental from a single hot-dog concession. Which is really besides the point: should the council be allowing the regular part privatisation of a public park during the height of the summer?
Any income from minor side-aspects like cafes is nothing compared with the capital value of the land its potential for development. What would be the commercial rental income from six story apartment blocks built all over Finsbury Park, for example? I am not suggesting the council is planning to sell off this park.
To further clarify the Down Lane Park land swap: I'm sure you are aware that the council's idea of a land swap was to exchange a big chunk of clean green parkland for a chunk (smaller?) of a former recycling facility at the northern end, whose land may have been contaminated. The locals were to be short-changed in several ways: would the council have attempted this stunt elsewhere in the Borough one wonders?
Any resistance to the Down Lane Park building programme was to the good and any concern expressed by local councillors was the minimum the community could expect of them in the face of bonking madness. But situations like that are not the norm; this was an egregious case. Councillors spoke up mainly because they were acting on behalf of constituents who value it as a park, not because the park was a money-making enterprise.
I was interested to read about the misleading of cabinet members over how parkland was accounted for. I am given to understand that a big new housing development alongside AP Park will be counting in parts of AP Park in order to qualify for planning approval. There is something fishy about this.
Just how many times can a public park be used, in planning terms, to enable developers to meet their obligations for open space and justify developments alongside? (this is not wholly rhetorical).
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C’mon Clive, you should know better than to write about Parks as land in its “normal, natural state. Most English landscape is not “natural” and inherited from some prehistory. It’s made. By people. Some were farmers. Some were wealthy landowners. Some parks were laid out.
The notion of a city park as some sort of empty green space with no other activity going on, is an idealised myth. And often worse - a recipe for poorly used and potentially dangerous places. Parks ‘work’ successfully’ (or fail to work) just like any other public spaces. With a diversity of uses and users who criss-cross the park and make it safe and overlooked.
Jane Jacobs set this out fifty years ago. And more recent work – for example by Ken Worpole is in the same tradition.
You accuse the Council of trying to “milk” parks. Do you think local councils should cease charging rent to commercial cafés in parks? Should boating lakes be subsidized and free?
Should Regents’ Park evict London Zoo and the Open Air Theatre? When was your denunciation of the Kenwood Picnic Concerts?
Do you you disapprove of a deal with the Mean Fiddler organisation because the Council didn’t ‘milk’ enough? Or do you just object to music events in Finsbury Park?
About Down Lane Park, you'll be disappointed to hear that the story you’ve been told about “a big chunk of clean green parkland” at the southern end of the park is simply untrue. The site was a school called Down Lane School. Which - as far as I know - was bombed.
The current area includes the former school caretaker’s house; a pavilion/children’s nursery; offices and storage area for Parks’ staff; a carpark for park users; and play equipment on earth bunds. (I think these were created from spoil from the nearby road.)
The alleged contamination of the Reuse & Recycling site is speculation. Currently it transfers waste – the stuff isn’t buried. Though interestingly, Tottenham Marshes – now part of Lee Valley Regional Park – was many years ago used to dump domestic waste.
Lots of brownfield sites have a history of industrial use. Checking for contamination is an automatic (and legally required) part of the process of reclaiming such land. That’s why the land beneath the Thames Barrier Park, for example, had to be capped.
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Permalink Reply by Mr Growbag on
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Those hankering for a park which is a slice of England in its "natural" state should amble over to Queens Wood by Muswell Hill. According to the signs in situ, this is likely to be the original woodland around which London grew and certainly dates from at least 1600. Regardless of the history - it's lovely and full of birds (including jays and all 3 types of woodpecker). One of my favourite local spots...
More on the friends of Queen's Wood page for anyone interested.
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Thanks for the tip Mr Growbag. I would also add in similar vein Coldfall Wood. Coldfall Wood at least, is not an "idealised myth" – it might help Alan in understanding the concept of original, natural state. I had never been there before last year and did not even know of its existence. I was taken there by members of the Tree Trust for Haringey after their AGM.
Re Down Lane Park: the story of the council's plans (above) sounds so benign that the locals must have been mad to object to development over one third of their park. Why on earth did the Friends of Down Lane Park describe the council's plans as a "bombshell". They really are a perverse lot aren't they!
The Mean Fiddler deal was a poor deal from whichever perspective you look at it. I would rather that no deal had been done at all, regarding this as a severe compromise over park use. It sometimes leaves the land in a poor condition afterwards, with grass churned up by heavy vehicle movement.
Since parks generate little or no income, councillors are not continuously acting in their defence. Councillors are not pro-active over parks - only when they come under threat, sometimes from the council themselves, is their any action.
By contrast, the money that can be made from further development of open space is continuous. But there's a ratchet effect operating: once open space is gone, its unlikely ever to be reclaimed and we will all be the poorer for it. -
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Clive, you might enjoy the classic: The Making of the English Landscape. This celebrates not some "original natural state" but the layer upon layer of accretion to what came before.
Which sometimes included, as James Walsh points out, the complete remodelling of landscape surrounding country houses - with gardens laid out sometimes formally; or, as with Capability Brown, as idealised 'nature' - perhaps based on Italian classical painting.
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You ask whether a land swap at Down Lane Park might have been a "benign" option? Possibly yes. But only:
● If the swap had really been like for like - with accurate measurements. Or even better, with the park enlarged -
● If the building proposals at the southern end had been in scale and not eight storeys.
● If consultation with local residents had built trust and confidence - instead of doing precisely the opposite.
● If there had been proper consultation with Pavilion Nursery, with costed practical proposals to rebuild and relocate it.
● If the scheme had begun with the needs of local residents, and with improving the park and its facilities as a central goal.
Instead it was quite clear that the planners, regeneration 'experts', and property developers were completely carried away with the exultant poetry of the Tottenham Hale Urban Centre Masterplan. -
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Permalink Reply by james walsh on
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'Capability' Jones and other 18th C. Landscapers were well know for evicting whole villages and demolishing their dwellings because they were an eyesore. When i look at these 'ideal' landscapes i get a bit depressed.
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Cheers Clive - like you , unaware of Coldfall Wood's existence! That's my next "local day out" sorted...
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Permalink Reply by Liz on
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Alan, some essential reading for you: Historical Landscape Chracterisation which is the latest (and dare I say without some total geekdom showing) exciting way of viewing landscape.
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Not only "a bombshell", but the Friends of Down Lane Park also described their reaction to council's plans for their park as being "appalled and flabbergasted".
I know that local councillors, all members of the majority group, did eventually mount some opposition and later the council abandoned their plans to deprive Tottenham residents of a "substantial and valuable part of the park".
The remaining question has to be, how did such an obviously misguided policy ever get so far? How much time and money did the council waste on these plans that a reasonable person could have detected were unacceptable at an early stage?
The impression left is that the council (i.e the permanent staff), literally, is out of control. Meaning that council officers carry on with their own ideas, beyond the guidance of governance, their political masters, until the faeces impact upon the revolving cooling apparatus. They seem to be able to carry on for too long in their own private bubble until eventually it collides with reality.
I would be curious to know when local councillors first got wind of officers' plans for development.
Lest this seems too churlish, full marks to Alan for coining regenero-speak™.
Having glanced at the grandiose masterplan, I would guess that some of these faceless planners need taking outside for a darn good thrashing (this is just a private fantasy. They'll be around to collect their ****plated pensions – *insert your choice of high value metal here).
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There is also the Ancient Tree Hunt which offers a way of recording ancient trees.
http://www.ancient-tree-hunt.org.uk/discoveries/interactivemap/
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If the worst comes to the worst we could always try one of these.
http://www.friendsofnauntonpark.org.uk/tree_sculpture.html
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