milk76

I am happy for you Bobby, either you have been very fortunate or you have a high threshold for your definition of a parking problem. My friend Tina, on Melbourne, has to park on neighbouring streets often when she returns during daylight hours. She has on occasion had to park by my place which is a hell of a long walk with bags and a buggy. It is these daytime driving locals, often women with children, who suffer the most from weekday commuter parking strains. As a full time working man, who uses the train to comute, I am less often affected as I drive mostly on call at night or at weekends. For at home partners it is a very real problem. Also for the elderly and those with some physical limitations.

Well I am delighted that the new 2hr CPZ is coming in. Our streets near the station voted in favour at the last consultation. It was the streets more than 300M from the station that swung the vote heavily against a CPZ previously. There are 19 commuter cars right now on Abbotswood/Talbot! In addition six that I recognise on St Francis, admittedly there are probably more there but It is not my street so I can't be sure. I regularly ride the train back out of town with people who park here. Some drive in from miles away for the free parking near the station. Personally I would rather take two trains and pay the larger fare but each to his own I guess. I just feel sorry for Derwent Grove, Melbourne et al who were not offered the chance this time. Hopefully you guys will get the option soon. I guess this new portal will at least track interest in your streets.

Well, I voted in favour as It will remove the 25-39 commuters I sample every day now on Abbotswood and Talbot roads. Same cars every weekday morning arrive between 6.30 and 8.30 and use the station. Will transform the lives for the poor guys on St Francis too. Just a shame it will not yet help the poor sods on Melbourne and Derwent. Nice touch that the football fans that drive in will still be able to park in the evening and on a Saturday. If this kind of measure is the only way to force people to take a bus to the station rather than driving so be it.

That is never going to happen Siduhe. Southwark have had the money set aside for the Greendale renovation for over a year now and are rightly set on not losing that facility. It will be overhauled quite rapidly now. Meadow?s only chance would be to build, or keep, the statium and any housing on the land that they actually own. A previous developer submitted plans for sixty flats on the carpark out front. But of course sixty if far fewer and less profitable than five hundred so I suspect that they will just try to sell it on. They will have to take a haircut but a big health and fitness chain might be interested.

Excellent news. Perhaps the future of the site can now gravitate away from property developers and back towards a long term sporting facility as was always intended. I am not a fan of this Labour run Southwark administration or many of it's decisions over the last few years. On this issue though I have to admit that they have been consistent and strong. Congratulations to them.

It does mean that the astroturf will be rebuilt to a standard that means schools like the charter will be able to book it and use it again too now.

Never lose sight of one fact. It is in the original deeds (you can find them online), from when the land was sold off by King's College that, if the sports ground ceases to be a going concern then it defacto reverts to council ownership. The property developers over the years have deliberately run it down financially to try and leverage local support for their self interested view of the best layout. They will not shut it down however as the council would have every right to repossess it from them. This might be the best solution! Personally I would rather see them cut their losses, forget the housing and run the site long term for some profit. Get in a David Lloyd who will pay them a handsome rent and remove most of their overhead, let them extend the facilities out over the carpark if they want. Replace the grass with 4G and rent out the pitch 30-40 hours a week rather than just 3. Let the council refurb and run the astroturf so all the local teams and youth groups can use it again plus the new school if they want to rent it.

The astroturf is owned by Southwark. It is leased to the owners of the club on the basis that they maintain it and can rent it out to local groups. It used to be a great facility about fifteen years agoand was very widely used. Sadly the club have failed to maintain it to a safe standard. As a result for years now it has been deemed unsafe for schools and youth groups. It is a disgrace. The council have the funds allocated to take it back and renovate it so that it can be used, all week, by every group that wants to. The property developers trying to appropriate and buldose it seems to have halted the council's efforts for some reason. The new school being built and this ground is accessable from it without crossing a road. I would have thought that this would strengthen the case for bringing it back under public control.

Now having had some time to reflect on yesterday's totally unacceptable events i have come to a couple of conclusions. Number one. The stadium must be responsible for the events that are held on their grounds and secure them. They have not been over recent weeks and certainly were not on Sunday. I would bet you a pound to a penny that "Chris the boss" felt just as intimidated as I did going to try to reason with that mob. If in fact he ever did. Number two. The alcohol license for inside the stadium should not be extended outside it to third party events like this again. They have come within a hair of losing it before when they abused it, late nights with loud music and open windows, a few years ago. Outside with no effective security they were way out of bounds on this one. Three, the police have now been clear, call 101 if this happens again. It won't take officers from an emergency situation but they will respond.

They have now moved onto Sainsburys carpark. Surely the noise team need to involve the police

Everyone email the noise team too. They can't/won't log unanswered calls.

So not stopping at seven then

I have just been over. They are actually battling to create the loudest multi thousand watt sound systems. This is beyond antisocial. Please contact southwark noise if you are affected too. http://www.southwark.gov.uk/noise-and-antisocial-behaviour Or by phone.

No they are not different. We as a society designate certain areas as non development spaces. We may do this for differing reasons in each case but the principle is the same. There will be some who will want to erode this protection in certain spaces and for their own reasons. It might be a property developer for profit, a charity to maximise it's donations or even taper who has decided that he wants to back moving his football club. The principle remains the same, as James Barber says. Erode the protection to one space and erode the protection for others. Set the precedent and you have opened the floodgates. Dulwich Estates should not be able to destroy the School field and Hadley should not be able to turn two pitches and a green space into one pitch and profit.

Parking on junctions is just crazy. It increases risk for drivers, forcing them to creep out into traffic because line of sight is blocked. worse though is danger for pedestrians trying to cross roads at junctions. It has always baffled me that the highway code was never enforced in London in this regard. If yellow lines are the only way to enforce the code and reduce these risks then so be it. One would think that five meters would be long enough down most side roads but I guess there is evidence on this. Oh and Fox ?125 is the annual cost of a residents parking permit across all the southwark zones.

The club is not unsustainable in it's current form. This myth is the carefully orchestrated result of a dozen years of ownership by property developers, interested in it's long term failure, as a land banking exercise. A car wash was installed, and charged minimal rent, that used the club's water and power! It cost the club tens of thousands rather than making them! A gym and courts making a net pittance for the club. This has received at least three significant buy out offers from national chains that I have been told about, including David Lloyd, over the last ten years. All declined but one can only imagine the monthly rent they would pay for a facility of this size in this area. Astroturf pitch rented from the council allowed to run into such disrepair that it can no longer pass health and safety for juniors events. That revenue cut off. An utter intransigence to switching from a hugely costly to maintain real turf pitch to 4G. Not to mention that the turf can only be played on a handful of hours each week so cannot be rented out to others during the weekdays. Tens of thousands out, tens of thousands not coming in. I have watched this deliberate enforced decline ever since I moved close by in 1996 with growing incredulity. The site may well not be worth the 5 million that Hadley paid for it as a sports and educational facility. But it can certainly be a rather profitable ongoing concern. Please do not take at face value spin from a group that are hunting for an eight or nine figure short term payday.

It is

So the Headline is actually. The Cherry Tree Pub is adults only at night but welcomes families during the daytime. I am upset because I should be an exception to this stated, and common practice, rule. My solution is to try and hurt this new local business with a misleading headline on a local forum.

They fixed it about a month ago. Amazing the difference it made for the worse when it was broken.

Just to be clear. I do not believe that motorcycles should be using Greendale cycleway. But at least it is wide and has a separate footpath on the right. The path from Greendale to Dulwich Hamlets is nothing like as wide. Only a fool would think it is safe to cut through here.

It is crazy, illegal and dangerous behaviour. I live on the estate next to Dulwich Hamlets and regularly run in the evenings along the path next to the club then up Greendale to the village. Every other week on average I have to get out of the way of a motorbike using this path and Greendale as a rat run. Last October I was going one way, a lady walking her dog was passing me the other and a pizza gogo scooter came around the corner and both of us had to jump into the hedge or get mown down. The git just gave us a thumbs up and shouted sorry. Two kids racing next to each other overtaking on their little 125s is also not uncommon and the path cannot be more than six or seven feet wide. I often then see them parked up and playing on the astroturf afterwards. It is only five minutes longer to ride around Melbourne and past the station surely? I never listen to music whilst going that way now so I can hear them coming. I wish the cops would just put up a discreet video camera for a couple of weeks and send them all fines. That would stop it pretty quick i am sure. It is only a matter of time until someone gets hit. Although fortunately as this seems to be an evening thing it is less likely to be a child from the school up there I suppose.

Y.E.S

I can second how good the Flying Pig was for the England match.

Sainsburys signed up to an S106 contract requiring them to maintain, secure and run the park in a set manner in return for permission to build their supermarket. It is the same contract that ensured they building of champion hill stadium as an asset that can only be used for community sports, leisure and educational purposes. These contracts are very common to preserve community facilities from overdevelopment. The council can and does enforce these legally binding contracts.