Notice of Special General Meeting and other news

Dear Friends of the Scrubs,

Your Trustees met this week, and, as usual, there’s quite a lot to report including requests for action. (items 6 and 7)

1. There will be a Special General Meeting held by Zoom on March 2nd at 6.00 pm to clarify our Constitution and the appointment of Trustees. The Notice, with explanations is attached here. We will send out Zoom details nearer the time. The Annual General Meeting will be held – we hope in person – on May 10th at 6.30 pm, and the Notice for that will follow in good time.

2. HS2 information - HS2 will shortly start work on the piling and pipe-laying for the sewer on the Scrubs, and, we are told, also decorate the hoardings with the illustrations agreed by Ben Novak. See their information here https://assets.hs2.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2022/01/Notice-of-Installation-of-Open-Cut-Drainage-in-Wormwood-Scrubs-final-updated-date.pdf

3. Trustee Walk with LET - the periodic walk with Trustees and members of the Law Enforcement Team took place in early January. Trustees emphasised the need to enforce the rules, including those limiting dog walkers to 4 dogs, and not allowing bicycling on the Scrubs. It is clear that there has already been good progress with the LET, but that there is some way to go yet. It was reiterated that for any urgent or serious problems, people should continue to call 999. There will soon be a dedicated phone number for Old Oak, College Park and the Scrubs, which we will circulate when available. The LET email address is oldoakcollegepark_northwards@lbhf.gov.uk .As a reminder, the LET team is also responsible for the following:

a. Providing high visibility patrols to deter crime and anti-social behaviour;

b. Fly tipping / waste investigations;

c. Report broken / damaged street furniture – lights, bins, seating etc;

d. Enforcing the Councils byelaws / licenses;

e. Park patrols and locking.

4. Park Run last Saturday - We have written to Steve Hollingworth (the senior LBHF Officer) to say: We greatly regret that the ParkRun – which we generally endorse enthusiastically – was permitted to take place last Saturday when the ground was very wet, resulting in extremely muddy tracks which could easily have been avoided. We ask that the ParkRun organisers be advised that it cannot happen on the Scrubs when the ground is so wet.

5. Hedge Laying A reminder that the hedge laying workshops to undertake the necessary management of the hedge between the ‘meadow’ and the airplane field will be taking place between 10 and 3 on January 26th and 29th and February 9th and 12th. Do come and join in, or watch, or bring refreshments for the volunteers and the professionals.

6. LIDO - there are ideas in progress for building a lido in this part of London. Your Trustees are very positive about the idea. A Lido would fulfil the terms of the Wormwood Scrubs Act (recreation, exercise and enjoyment of the people of the metropolis) and if carefully located largely on the present Linford Christie Stadium site it could both avoid encroaching on green areas on the Scrubs or interfering with LCS activities, and prevent any of the earlier plans for overdevelopment of LCS, while being combined with the necessary improvements and upgrading of the existing LCS facilities. The current (still early stage proposal) is is to build community support, find a great location and raise the money to create a beautiful, sustainable, new public lido for west London and LCS/Scrubs is not the only site under consideration. The group proposing the scheme are very clear that a location and design would need to be well supported by local residents. At the moment the organisers are gathering public support via www.westlondonlido.com and many hundreds have already shown their interest. We encourage you to go to the website and register your interest, We recognise that there’s a long way to go.

7. Imperial College's proposals for the 'North Acton Cluster' This item has been provided (for which we are grateful) by Henry Peterson, who also helped with the Lido briefing.

Not content with its 'White City Campus' and 35 storey residential tower in Wood Lane, Imperial College has submitted a planning application for seven new buildings on the former Carphone Warehouse site at 1 Portal Way in North Acton. This proposed development includes a 56 storey tower (one higher than the near completed One West Point'). Outline consent is sought for two further towers of 'up to 50 storeys'.

Imperial's architects Pilbrow and Partners show a CGI image of North Acton were this application to be approved and other previous planning consents built out. This group of extreme high-rise buildings have never featured in any 'plan' for North Acton. They are the result of developers coming forward with applications that claim precedents from what has gone before. Ealing's Planning Committee since 2015 has granted permissions for a series of towers on behalf of OPDC, under a 'scheme of delegation'. On this latest occasion OPDC are retaining the decision for its own Planning Committee to make.

The Old Oak Neighbourhood Forum and groups in Ealing are rallying their members to object. Consent to this scheme would undermine the December 2020 intervention of Secretary of State Robert Jenrick to strengthen London Plan policies against tall buildings except where specifically identified in local plans. This would not bode well in efforts to stop three 35 storey towers being built at Kensal Canalside, along with yet further proposals in Scrubs Lane, If you have a moment to join with Ealing residents in submitting an objection, these are some of the points which you might want to make:

· Modified London Plan Policy D9 is meant to protect us from further tall buildings of this scale – unless and until a local plan is clear on suitable locations and appropriate building heights. No such local plan yet exists.

· Residential towers are now known to use far more embedded carbon in their construction, and more energy in their daily use, than lower rise housing. These are proposals from a past era.

· The ‘North Acton cluster’ is fast becoming London’s latest urban renewal disaster – traffic-ridden, windswept, sunless and with empty ground floor shop units and poor public spaces

· Views and skylines across West London continue to be destroyed by developments which will prove to be of the wrong kind in the wrong place. Please do not repeat the errors of Vauxhall/Nine Elms/Battersea.

Please take a moment to submit your objections, particularly for the traffic implications and spoiling the views, both good points from a FOWWS perspective. You can object via email to planningapplications@opdc.london.gov.uk. giving a reference One Portal Way 21/0181/OUTOPDC. Please include your full name and address as OPDC will ignore representations without this information. The end of the consultation period is midnight Friday 28th January, but legally OPDC are required to take account of responses up until the time of a decision.

Lastly, the OPDC Draft Local Plan has still not been adopted (now 4.5 years late). Henry Peterson’s group, with our support, made a final attempt to persuade the Planning Inspector of the Plan's serious failings, at an 'examination' session on January 11th and now await the Inspector’s response.

Thank you for getting this far! We look forward to seeing you on the Scrubs and at the Special General Meeting on zoom.

Best wishes

Sir Stephen Waley-Cohen

First Floor, 11 Garrick Street, London WC2 9AR

T: 020 7287 7612 M: 07850 680000