The community of Old Malden has been asking for a café in this park for a very long time so that hot drinks/snacks/ice creams can be provided in the park during the football season, whilst waiting for children playing tennis or just playing in the playground.

So, we were delighted, earlier this year, that the Hooky Street Café had come to Manor Park, providing coffee and cake out of a converted horsebox trailer. This has become a real hit locally.

As this was all agreed with Kingston Council, imagine our shock when we heard that the same council have asked the Hooky Street mobile café to stop trading for the “foreseeable future”. They’ve even gone as far as saying that they need to review their agreement and then put it out for tender.

The café owner invested thousands of pounds in the mobile catering unit. And they also offered to pay for an electrical hook-up when they first came to the park, but the council said this would be for a later date. In the interim they’ve had to use a diesel generator. This has now resulted in a noise complaint, which has led the council to ask Hooky Street to leave the park with immediate effect. We think this is incredibly unfair, given that there would have been no noise issue if the council had taken up Hooky Street’s offer in the first place.

If we get enough people to please sign this petition to get Hooky Street back up and running in the park, then Kingston Council will have to listen to the community and act on it.  Please sign and pass on to all your friends and family that have been impacted and let’s get Hooky St café back in our park.