As you may already know Islington Council’s park department, Greenspace, decided on Friday to withdraw its planning application for proposed regeneration of Barnard Park. Sport England had objected to the park plan submitted, which led to the Secretary of State for Communities and Local Government “calling in” the plan and a Public Inquiry being organised for next year.

However Greenspace has now reached a compromise acceptable to Sport England based on a 9-a-side football pitch, not a 7-a-side football pitch, as was in its proposal. This means that there need not be a Public Inquiry, and also that the regeneration of the park could take place in one phase instead of two (as was previously anticipated). It will allow also the Council to bring forward plans to provide a community hub building that would include new park toilets.

LBI’s press release suggests that the detailed design of the compromise has still to be worked up, but it is to be consistent with the key elements of the plan in the application (see below). It will involve a new planning application and further community consultation.

Although the Friends of Barnard Park supported the application, we are open minded as to what is now proposed and are relieved that there is no longer a possibility of an 11-a-side destination pitch in our community park. We will be following these new developments over the next few weeks and will post updates on our website as we have more information.

Meanwhile we would like to thank everyone for all their support to date.

Please see this article on the friends site: http://www.barnardpark.org/news/