Please help Save the Velodrome - it's a facility for everyone

[HerneHope]

Hi Everyone

The Herne Hill Velodrome is seriously under threat of closure. The campaign to save it has started with an invitation to a public meeting on 6th October. Please show your support on the website www.savethevelodrome.com or www.facebook.com/savethevelodrome.

We are trying to get an idea of numbers for the open meeting (details below) - we need as many people as possible. Please could you email [email protected] if you're planning on joining us.

Also please tell everyone - we need to show that people care about the facilities.

More information below from the press release:

?Save the Velodrome? Campaign launches with an open invitation to a public meeting.

An alliance of residents and cyclists has been formed to save a former Olympic

stadium from closure. The Herne Hill Velodrome is the oldest cycling track in the

country and the home of the 1948 Olympic Cycling Championships. But now it faces

closure due to deterioration and lack of funding. There is no alternative track in

London for the hundreds of children who ride and race there. In the past, that has

included Bradley Wiggins, the three-time Olympic gold medallist, who began his

competitive cycling career at Herne Hill.

The Campaign is the brainchild of Hillary Peachey, a local resident whose children

use the site regularly. She says, ?It seems shameful that, with 2012 approaching, London

cannot even sustain the facilities it has. That is why we are calling on Londoners as a

whole to save this precious resource.?

The Campaign kicks off with a public meeting at Dulwich College at 7.30 pm on

Wednesday 6th October. But Londoners are asked to register their support on

www.savethevelodrome.com

Campaigners aim to secure the future of the site and make it a viable long-term

facility for all, including local residents and schools.

The agenda for the public meeting is to:

? raise awareness of the plight of the facilities;

? hear suggestions for the future proposed regeneration;

? review potential plans.

To stay open, the Velodrome will need corporate and private funding, together with

volunteer support. The campaigners are hopeful of getting it.

Details of public meeting:

Wednesday 6th October

7.30pm to 9.30pm

Great Hall, Dulwich College

Dulwich Common, London SE21 7LD

For further information about the event/press enquiries:

Hillary Peachey [email protected]

[womanofdulwich]

I fully support this- natural cycling talent has been nurtured and developed at the velodrome- and it is a great base for all cycling activites- the youth mountain biking, cycle traiing, track biking- but so importantly for children/ youths. Local south London children cannot pop up to North London for the nearest track after school. We need to do everything we can to give young children access to sports,especially if their parents do not.

[Rhubarb&Custard]

http://www.guardian.co.uk/sport/blog/2010/sep/21/herne-hill-1948-london-olympics

Good article. Good luck with the campaign.

[Sandperson]

Yeah! It's a fantastic facility that's been negleted shamefully in the last few years. Get behind this!

[alice]

anyone know how many children use this each week? and how many youths?

[womanofdulwich]

easily 100 in the summer when light in evenings after school. a lot more on race nights

[James Barber]

My understanding is that many hundreds of people use Herne Hill Velodrome every week despite it current poor facilities.

Those facilities have crumbled for decades.

When the GLC was closed responsibility for the HHVD lease passed to Southwark Council. HHVD is a semi regional facility and would ideally be funded, much as Crystal Palace Sports Centre is, by the Greater London Authority.

[louisiana]

Saturday mornings too.

[Pearson]

+10000000 to all the above.

This is such a great facility it just can't be allowed to close.

It has become an integral part of our family weekends.

[mlteenie]

And the legenday Fausto Coppi raced there once.

I shall be at the meeting.

[eater81]

All it effectively is is a big slab of concrete, how can that be difficult to maintain? Id imagine some scum property developer has their greedy eye on it, probably with a few local councillors in their pocket.

[snowy]

Because Eater, Dulwich Estates will not sign a lease longer than a rolling 2 years. Which means that VLC and local groups find it nigh on impossible to fundraise for any capital works, as the length of tenure is too short.

The current surfacing is getting old, the covered stand is in a state of disrepair and can't be used any more, and the bleaker seats are getting old.

The amount of voluntary hours that are put into the HH Velodrome to make sure that it's regularly open and accessible to both young children riding mountain bikes, or on track, to professionals using it on open meets is incredible.

[louisiana]

The Dulwich Estate would like to hand over the site to a property developer to develop a leisure centre, which would certainly help to fill the Estate's coffers. The property developer in question has been Citygrove Securities, which has a subsidiary Dulwich Leisure Ltd. You can see a portfolio of Citygrove Securities developments here:

http://www.citygrove.com/portfolio.html

[womanofdulwich]

If you have never been to the velodrome, and have children who have not been there yet, i recommend you check it out now, and realise what their peers have had and your children will miss out on if something is not done.

It it an exceptional facility that fosters safe cycling, away from cars, dogs and pedestrians.

[oilworker]

The citygrove deal has been in the pipeline for at least five years but nothing has ever come of it. DE (in 2005) gave the impression that any leisure development would be done with the needs of cycling in general and with the continued use of the track in particular. Is there evidence that this approach has been moved away from and that cycling will not have a place at the velodrome post-development? Local residents have a general interest in how any development is undertaken (in that they will not wish to see a busy leisure facility which is open 18 hrs a day with all the associated noise/disruption) . Cyclists have a particular interest in seeing continued use of the site for their sport. Both groups will have effective lobbiers - this site is nearly in the middle of Dulwich Village - a haven for self-interested property and planning lawyers. The prowess of the cycling lobby group has already been proven by its refusal to be fobbed off with a sub-standard substitute by the Olympic Development Agency when Eastway Stadium in Hackney was closed down to make way for the Olympic Stadia. Both groups together should be enough to scare off any rapacious property developers but we cannot be complacent. Join the campaign!

[James Barber]

eater81,

Your suggestions of bribery and corruption amongst local councillors is extremely rude and unhelpful to helping HHVD.

The land HHVD sits on is Metropolitan Open Land and legally very protected from development. Any decision about this land has to go to the main planning committee and if contrary to the principles of MOL the Secretary of State.

The issue in my mind is the current accesses to the site are insufficient to keep the level of coming and going needed to make the site financially feasible and prosper. Unlocking cyclings potential for this site is about unlocking better access.

Plus of course negotiating a long lease with the Dulwich Estate who in my mind have been patient landlords for over 100 years.

[oilworker]

Access (although currently not ideal) is a minor issue here. What is needed is DE's acknowledgement and agreement that this site will only be developed in a very modest commercial way and that its current status as a public facility will not be jeapordised. Sports like track cycling, mountain biking, football etc. (the first two of which currently go on here - the latter used to) simply do not return a financial profit which is why this existing facility must be jealously guarded. Any development wich is predicated upon DE achieving a substantail rental income on the site would be a disaster.

[eater81]

Mr barber, i fully respect councillors like yourself who do their job for the good of the local community however you should know more than anyone that bribery and corruption are rife in the planning world, particularly with 100 million pound plus sites such as hhvd. This, combined with a conservative government and the general incompetence that characterises our great nation's planning departments means that citygrove will most likely have their wicked way and this unique, historic facility will be lost for ever.

[womanofdulwich]

I have always maintained that the Dulwich Estate have a ridiculously restrictive lease. It is not commercailly viable and any attempt to intensify use has been opposed by some local residents. anyone can make a planning application - even if they do not own it. Maybe an application for social housing on the site would encourage a better use?

[Ratpack]

How can we let somewhere like Herne Hill go?

Watch Sky News's piece here:

[HerneHope]

RADIO 4 COVERAGE: PM SHOW TODAY - Listen here!

Fantastic piece on the radio tonight on the Save the Velodrome campaign, including an interview with Dulwich Estate, the landowners, showing their support of the campaign. It's really worth listening to and hearing it all first hand. Click here. Go to minute 48 on the playing bar.

Hope to see you at the open meeting tomorrow. Details on the first message on this chain.

[Pearson]

I'll be there tomorrow evening for sure!

[womanofdulwich]

i had to leave half way through the meeting tonight- can someone update me on what happened in the second part.??? There was such a positive feeling in the hall when I left.