There’s an interesting item coming to the West Area Committee on April 2nd at the Methodist Church in Eastwood Road. (Remember this is the meeting where the public can speak and you get a hot drink too!).
This item is about sports pitches at the Park School site, near the new leisure centre.
Basically, five sports pitches will be ready by September 2009. It’s up to the committee to debate how to make use of them.
Should they be let out on a pitch-by-pitch basis to any club who wants to use them ?
Or should the council lease them to one club, who would then look after them?
If the council does hand them over to one club, which club – because four are interested:
1. Elmwood Colts Football Club
? 10 Teams in Club
? 110-120 members
? Looking at either booking or leasing options with repair and maintenance responsibility.
? Cash available as match funding for external grant applications, willing to apply to Lottery & Sport Soccer for funding.
? Football Association Charter Standard Club
? Current Match facility: John Fisher and Edwards Hall School
? Current training facility: various parks and playing fields, including Sweyne Park, Oakwood Park.
? Interested in use of facility under a lease agreement or just booking individual pitches.2. Rayleigh Boys Youth Football Club
? 30 Teams in Club
? 380 members
? Cash available as match funding for external grant applications, willing to apply to Football Association and Football Foundation for funding.
? Football Association Charter Development Club
? Current Match facility: Fairview, Grove Park, Rayleigh Sports & Social. ? Current training facility: King Georges Park, Grange, John Fisher, Fairview Park, Grove Park, Love Lane School, Grove Wood School.
? Looking for sole use of facility under a lease agreement with repair and maintenance responsibility.3. Hambro Colts Youth Football Club
? 18 Teams in Club
? 250 members
? Cash available as match funding for external grant applications, willing to apply to Football Foundation for funding.
? Football Association Charter Standard Club
? Current training facility: Rawreth Lane
? Current Match facility: Rocheway Adult Education Centre, Rochford.
? Disability Sports Activities currently undertaken and further planning/development plans in place.
? Have submitted action plans as part of the Active Rochford, (Rochford?s Community Sports Network), funding application to the Community Initiative Fund. Supplying match funding and leading on disability sports project.
? Interested in use of facility under a lease agreement or just booking individual pitches.4. Down Hall United Youth Football Club
? 2 Teams in Club
? 27 members
? No cash available to match fund, no response as to possible funding options.
? Not a Football Association Charter Standard Club
? Current training facility: Down Hall Primary School
? Current Match facility: Down Hall Primary School
? Club are looking to expand year on year.
? They are only interested in using the pitches on a bookings basis and not having a lease for sole use of the whole area.
A lot of people are clearly interested in the preschool. Do any of you have thoughts on this one?
Just like to say that my two children went to Downhall under fives preschool and it gave them so much confidence and they really enjoyed it. the staff are great and i would give 100% support for the planning application. So that the younger children in our area get the same start and experinces in preschool that my children did.
What consideration is going to be given to parking for these pitches? If the coucil is going to expect people to park in the Leisure Centre, they’ll be having a laugh – it overflows onto the road now. The road is not wide enough for cars to park on it, and I for one will not be happy to have cars parked outside my house every evening and during the weekends thus preventing my visitors from parking. Very careful consideration has to go into the potential parking problem this will cause and the additional nuisance put on homeowners, especially as this was not part of the initial planning application and am wondering how many people facing that land would have brought their properties had they known they would have to live opposite 5 football pitches. Houses on this development have already lost value, and have to beg the question what detremental effect is this further development going to have?
What I also wonder is what Shaun Scrutton and his planning department were thinking when the application for redevelopment was put forward. The planning of this is appalling – roads too narrow, houses crammed in, no consideration for lorries waiting to go into ASDA (entry to the service yard should have been from the industrial estate on the other side of ASDA), car park for leisure centre to small, and now football pitches and additional traffic.
Our house is on the market at the moment and has been for 6 weeks – it is being marketted for less than we paid for it – have spent a fortune in the gardens and conversions and have had zero interest. The council had think very carefully before residents start suing Rochford DC Planning Dept for poor planning and thus devaluing properties on this estate.
Corey, there will be extra parking provision for this.
Can’t dredge up the precise details off the council website tonight though….
I had seen the extra parking that was on offer – if memory serves it was about 36 spaces – so that’s the overflow from the leisure centre currently sorted, now what about parking for the football pitches? There is not the capacity on this development to deal with football clubs with, potentially, 300 members. There has been insufficient thought going into this, and absolutely no consideration for the people who have purchased on this development yet again.
The road infrastructure can not deal with it. This should have been thought through fully when the site was being developed to ensure that Priory Chase would be able to deal with the ASDA, Leisure Centre AND now football pitches. This is an absolutely ridiculous proposal and the planning dept should be brought to task over its inability to conduct effective planning, and ensure that infrastructure is in place to deal with this volume of traffic.
I fully agree. The Leisure Centre just about has enough parking spaces, however on occasions it spills out down Priory Chase and Temple Way.
What will happen if five football pitches are built with training for 300 football club members spaced out over the weekday evenings and then the weekend games with away teams visiting?
36 extra spaces will not help at all!
The whole area will be flooded with cars and the local residents will suffer……….yet even more.
This needs apposing. I for one am working the night of this meeting but it is plainly obvious that on the grounds of parking alone, that this decision to put football pitches there on the current plans should be overturned.
It sounds like this will mirror the problems being experienced at the playing field football pitches in Rawreth Lane near Bedloes Corner.
Will the planners never learn from other bad examples?
If you are concerned about this, the best way to get the subject properly discussed is to ask a question at the meeting.
You can submit in advance online at:
http://www.rochford.gov.uk/rdc/main.asp?page=1040
We will do a proper report later on today. But in the meantime, nothing was decided last night, it now goes to the cabinet. RDC said they would create 70 extra parking spaces.
Interestingly Rayleigh Boys, the largest of the clubs that are applying, are reading onlinefocus and are well aware of residents concerns. They think they could create more than 70 spaces RDC suggest, are talking about a car-sharing scheme and are suggesting having two local residents on their committee to help deal with/ avoid ‘neighbour’ problems.
Perhaps Rayleigh Boys would like to explain further…….
I am the founder of Hambro Colts Youth Football Club and would like to air the following thoughts.
We would be happy to take possession of this field on whatever terms the council or Local residents dictate and could assure you that we would be a responsible part of the community we are your local club with many members in and around the area of the pitches and have a proven track record of working with the community. Notwithstanding this it is obvious that some disruption will occur mainly on a Sunday which is matchday but we are not a club who wants 6 teams at each age range and restrict the amount of teams we start to ensure that they are in line with facilities and will not grow much more than 20 teams. We do and would remain training at Rawreth Lane recreation ground and would have very limited weekday usage. We see ourselves as a community club and would not want to cause any undue disruption but being realistic car sharing and any such measures would have limited effect on what is a perennial problem at most sporting venues. I would be more than happy to talk to any residents or other interested parties on the email bob@hambrocolts.co.uk
Sorry if I am being somewhat sceptical, but I have heard this “being a good neighbour” before – and look how Asda are now!
It is all very well these football clubs stating car sharing etc, but that has to be put forward to parents first, we are talking youth clubs here. What if it is inconvenient for these parents to share? What is going to happen on Sundays – their main match days with cars from the opposing teams? Where are they going to go? Residents of this development have visitors, and the busiest day for visitors on a weekend, is Sunday. Neither resident or our visitors should be inconvenienced by these pitches and the council and clubs must consider that there will potentially be one car per player, (22 cars per game) plus cars for coaches, subs and referees. I doubt all 5 pitches could be used at the same time, so lets work on the assumption that there will be 3 games playing = 66 cars (just for players). What if there are other games immediately after these games, where are those cars going to go? Will this additional car parking be used by gym users? Both myself and David have already posted that the car park overspills into Priory Chase and Temple Way now. 70 spaces is clearly not enough, and more thought has to go into this? Perhaps talking with the school and using their staff carpark is an option for additional parking?
I am pleased that Rayleigh Boys would like two residents to join their committee to be able to take residents concerns forward, and would be interested to hear if other teams that are bidding for this area are considering similiar action? If not, then perhaps they need to think if this is going to be the right place for them? We as residents have had more than our fill of inconvenience, and at the moment see this as another situation that will deny us the right to peaceful enjoyment of our properties.