Dear London Fields Users

We have arranged to meet with Paul Foinette, the manager of all the South Hackney parks, outside the Lido and discuss park maintenance snags with him. The last time we did this was last year, on 4th July, about 8 months after he took over the park from Stanley White. Since then Hackney parks have gone through further reorganisation, with another level of “development managers” between us and the people doing the work in the park. Our development manager is Bruce Irving, who we first met at our Sep. 23rd meeting.

 

On the last walkabout we found a long list of maintenance to sort out, some dating from original refurbishment, not all of which has been done yet. While persistent problems like leaving litter, burning the grass with barbecues, cycling too fast on pedestrian paths and cycling on the grass and wild areas, remain a problem. We have already asked for notices to try to moderate some of these anti social excesses. (A copy of our comments on last year’s walkabout is attached).

This is a suitable time, before the Green Flag inspection, to find urgent work for the park gardeners.

 

Streetscene & Hackney Council are organising a FREE cycle service with advice in London Fields, near the centre. 5 bicycle mechanics will be able to offer minor repairs for free.  Hackney sustainable transport team will be distributing cycling guides and leaflets promoting safe cycling and training. Reflective gear and lights will be on sale for below cost price.

 

We have been waiting for the replacement of the old games pitch for a long time now (over 10 years). Many of the younger people have been looking forward to the new one. The old one, with the enormous ugly black fence, had been built in the 1920’s. If you can’t remember it, it was pulled down 4 or 5 years ago. There has been a dispute about its replacement, which will be a fraction of its size. And so it went to the Planning Inspectorate for arbitration. The decision was finalised on 27/01/10, (see letter attached) and so we await to hear when it will finally be built. John Wade, the head of parks tells me “We have requested a timetable of works from the contractor and are also in the process of allocating a project manager.” This should be known within the next few weeks. 

 

The inspectorate also decided to allow the new pathway from the toilets to the northern playground, stopping the ever widening of the “desired line” path and keeping the path to 2m width. This will allow for the regeneration of the grass in the badly worn spread on either side.

 

We have received further letters from people asking for more Table Tennis tables in the park. The heavy use of the one we have and the wide spread of people of all ages and backgrounds using it, makes the funding of more tables a serious proposition. Perhaps we should get our local councillors interested.

 

We have had a few local people planning to hold small charitable public events on London Fields. Nothing has been finalised yet, but I will let you know when more information is available.