| Topic: | Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Re:Warren Farm - time for compromise? | |
| Posted by: | Raymond Havelock | |
| Date/Time: | 20/04/22 09:05:00 |
| Brentford have a location in Osterley and are currently in the process of a Planning application to develop the facility. What there is not are open spaces for public active use. For some reason everything that gets proposed is overblown and lavish ( except it seldom ever gets delivered that way.) just lavish in cost. Open space like Warren Farm is land already set aside for that purpose. it was levelled and drainage and sub soiled for outdoor sports use decades ago. Facilities are low level and basic. Too basic in all honesty and were never good enough from day one. Nor should they be overblown or too large or imposing. The Gunnersbury Park facility is an example of that. And the consequence of that is it is now also too expensive for too many. Worse still there are 3 sports grounds on the perimeter of the Park. 2 of which remain with outdated and rudimentary facilities of long outdated standards. The Warren Farm area serves a part of the Borough that does have a good bit of open space but very little of it accessible to local people. There are plenty of Nature trails and wilded areas, but when there are dozens of others impacting the ground and constantly disturbing, calling it 'Wilding' is a bit of a naive description. Disney Wilding maybe. Making sports venues difficult for vehicle parking is also a folly. Away game visitors come from all over, kit has to be carried and most car share anyway and have done for generations. I don't think any commercial club should have the location for a closed facility. Even a shared facility will restrict public access and overload it on other days. So it should be fully public, basic and low cost, accessible to all, with areas and planting to make it as environmentally sustaining as possible. Possibly with solar power and wind power discreetly located or on the facilities to make it a self sufficient as possible. It should be ring fenced for all those future generations and certainly for the huge swell in population that is about to impact with so little in place other than the sales pitches of Crossrail and developers liaisons with council executives and elected members. |