Dear Burgess Park Protection supporters,
Re: Request to Lobby Key Decision Makers and Reminder to Submit Planning Objections (just 2 weeks to deadline!)
Many thanks for signing our petition and to those of you who have kindly taken the time to submit an objection to the planning application for a 7-storey tower-block at this entrance to our park.
We have nearly doubled the number of petition signatures to nearly 2,000 and objections have jumped from about 20 to over 100.
The running total now is 100 objections, with 13 supporting statements.
PLEASE LOBBY KEY COUNCIL DECISION MAKERS
This week we are asking supporters to email the key Southwark cabinet councillors to lobby them to oppose the building on this Metropolitan Open Land and to fulfil the council’s promise to integrate this final crucial section of the Burgess Park Masterplan into the park’s wildlife site by landscaping it.
Please explain to them in your own words what this means to you personally and maybe share our vision for the site, as painted by one of our members in the pic below.
The councillors are
COUNCIL LEADER
Cllr Kieron Williams – he is the leader of the council and the ward councillor for this part of the park.
kieron.williams@southwark.gov.uk
PARKS CABINET MEMBER
Cllr Catherine Rose – she is the cabinet member for parks and so responsible for implementing the park’s masterplan and protecting & improving our protected Metropolitan Open Land.
catherine.rose@southwark.gov.uk
REGENERATION CABINET MEMBER
Cllr Johnson Situ – is the councillor for regeneration and so responsible for ensuring that the Borough’s regeneration is carried out in a green way. It is crucial he understands that the large increase in housing densities being proposed all around the park, require the protection and enhancement of all our Metropolitan Open Land.
johnson.situ@southwark.gov.uk
If you have time, please also contact your local Southwark ward councillors asking them to lobby Cllrs Williams, Rose and Situ to protect the park’s Metropolitan Open Land and to complete the site’s integration into the park as promised by the council in 2016.
PLANNING OBJECTIONS
If you have not already, please submit an objection to the planning application using this link.
https://planning.southwark.gov.uk/online-applications/applicationDetails.do?activeTab=makeComment&keyVal=QO7ZIJKBLA600
Suggested formal text for the planning application (as opposed to the emails to lead councillors) is below.
And finally, please keep sharing the petition and help us get to our next target of 2,500 signatures.
FACEBOOK PAGE
If you would like to help us with the campaign, please join our Facebook group at
If you would like to help the campaign join our Facebook Page at
https://www.facebook.com/groups/518271348707458(Called: No Building on Burgess Park MOL Campaign)
Many thanks
Donnachadh McCarthy
pp Burgess Park Action Group
SAMPLE OBJECTION - Please feel free to customise and would be great if you could personalise it as much as possible.
Objection to building 7 storey residential tower block on Burgess Park’s Metropolitan Open Land by its entrance at 1 to 13 Southampton Way
Planning reference number: 21/AP/0451
1. The Southwark Plan clearly rules out any building on Metropolitan Open Land other than ancillary to open space uses.
2. The London Plan also rules out any building on Metropolitan Open Land other than ancillary to open space uses.
3. The open space protection allocated to this land has been in place since the early 1980s, as it was part of the designated landbank for incorporation into Burgess Park by the GLC and the then Southwark Council under the Mid-South Southwark Local Plan, then its successor the Southwark Unitary Development Plan, then the first Southwark Plan and finally the latest adopted new version of the Southwark Plan.
4. The MOL protected status was defended successfully at THREE public inquiries into the above plans.
The land was designated MOL by Southwark Council with temporary licences to occupy, which have lapsed. The council should negotiate and keep the commitment to integrate the land into Burgess Park.
5. The proposed tower block would be building right on top of the Southampton Way entrance to the park and would seriously damage the open-space nature of the approaches to the park-entrance.
We know of no other park in London that would welcome a 7-storey tower block at its entrance!
6. This MOL site is immediately adjacent to the park’s New Church Road wildlife site. This site has been in gradual development over the last 40 years, incorporating privately owned MOL earmarked for the park, bit by bit as the council funds allowed, following the demise of the GLC.
A rough estimate for the creation of this wildlife site by the purchasing and demolition on the housing, business premises on the site would amount to £150 million in today’s terms.
It would be heart-breaking to allow that investment in public monies and the heartache paid by the families whose homes were compulsorily bought, to be squandered by allowing this tower block to veto the completion of the wildlife site.
7. The location of the block to the south-west and west of the immediately adjacent wildlife site would damage it in two ways.
a/ It would cause significant overshadowing of the wildlife site for significant proportions of the day, especially in winter. Thus, it would damage its wildlife potential.
b. It would cause light pollution & human interference to the immediately adjacent wildlife site, destroying its habitat ability for bird-nesting and bat roosting.
8. The Southwark & London Plans both commit to maximising biodiversity & tree cover and expanding greenspaces across London. Giving permission to building on Burgess Park’s protected MOL on a site earmarked for decades for incorporation into the park, would seriously contravene such planning provisions.
9. A previous assessment of the New Church Road wildlife site by the London Wildlife Trust said the following “This is, without doubt, the richest wildlife habitat in Burgess Park and the whole of the north-west Southwark area. Although Burgess Park was designated as a Borough Grade 2, site by London Ecology Unit, I believe this portion of the Park is of significantly greater value – effectively Grade 1.”
The council in 2016 passed a motion committing to the CPO of this remaining MOL designated for the park.
Granting planning permission now for the tower-block would be a tragedy.
10. The immediate area has significant proposals for large high-density new housing developments, that are not MOL & with almost zero green space, so this protected site within the Burgess Park Metropolitan Open Land does not qualify therefore for any exceptional circumstances to allow its protection to be over-ruled.
11. A potential doubling in urban residential intensification is in progress around all the boundaries of the park, with no parallel increase in open space. This makes it more imperative that this site is protected and landscaped as planned for decades.
I look forward to the planning committee upholding the site’s protection and so rejecting this unwelcome planning application and allowing the original vision for the completion of this final section of the park’s assembly and completion to proceed.
Yours sincerely
A. N. Other