Olympic Jamaica Village gets green light

Following our recent reports about the olympic village planned for Finsbury Park next year, the ten day event has been given the go-ahead by Haringey Council's licensing committee.

Running from August 3-12, the festival will celebrate various aspects of Jamaican culture and see some Jamaican destinations recreated across the park.

There will also be a main stage for live music acts, along with giant screens broadcasting coverage of the 2012 Games, a real sand ‘beach’ and swimming pool.

As part of a number of conditions on the licence, Jamaica Village has agreed to a three-day “quiet period” from August 7 to 9, and to distribute leaflets with a complaints hotline for residents concerned about noise.

The organisers told the committee that tickets for the 15,000-capacity event, which will run from 11am to 11pm each day, will cost a “considerable sum” but prices have not yet been fixed.

Just to the north of us in Ally Pally, plans for the Heineken village for the Dutch team are making progress too.

In an Old Street cafe conversation this week I learned that Ally Pally are making plans to help local the local economy capitalise on the huge influx of visitors into the area that will result from the Dutch event.

Sandwiched between the two events as we are, the traders on Green Lanes may well stand to gain little from either event unless a marketing campaign starts pretty pronto. 

I've contacted the Harringay Traders' Association to make them aware of the Ally Pally plans and asked if there are currently any similar plans to attract either national group here to Harringay. For better or worse, thinking along these lines is not yet on the agenda.

What do you think? Would you welcome a traders' campaign to attract vistors from the Olympic villages to Harringay?