This is my letter in this week’s RTT (p 10):
Jane Harrison’s description of the un- or under-used sites in the Old Deer Park for a school is timely (Letters June 12). The Park is Crown land, let on long leases which happen to expire next April. This is a rare opportunity to review and change the uses we make of this asset to better fit modern needs.
The Richmond and Kew Societies published The Old Deer Park, Richmond: A Framework For Conservation And Enhancement in 2012 describing the parts into which the Park is divided and detailing the leaseholders and the their leases. The main part (73 acres of parkland) is on a Council lease which expires next April, as does those on the car park south of the A316 (5 acres), the swimming pool (4 acres), the athletics association’s 25 acres and the cricket club’s 15 acres, partly sublet for other sports. Other parts are on longer leases.
They intended this report to spark a vigorous public conversation about the park’s future. Instead, there have been three years of silence. The Council has, apparently, done and said nothing; the existing vested interests have no doubt been lobbying behind the scenes for new leases on the same favourable terms as before. It may be that the plan is to announce a fait accompli at the last moment and tell the public that this is the only deal possible.
This is a scandalous missed opportunity to build a school where one is desperately needed, in an actual park, instead of misnaming a converted office block on a main road. Two of North Richmond’s silent councillors, Cllrs Blakemore and Speak, are cabinet members, and presumably have some clue about what’s happening behind the scenes. Let them break their silence and inform us, the residents, what the council is doing about the Deer Park.
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Letters of support to the RTT would be helpful.