New opportunity to save the woods!! Deadline Friday 23rd

[geneie]

Reading the latest on this long long thread galvanised me into action. I wrote to the three Church officials the SSW seems to think is on their side.

I wrote:- I am writing to let you know that I approve of Southwark's plans for Camberwell Old and New Cemeteries.

I understand there has been a campaign against what I believe to be a sensible and proper decision by the London Borough of Southwark to make more burials possible in their cemeteries.

My family have lived in Southwark for at least eight generations. I have many family members buried in all the local cemeteries. I think the earliest in the Camberwell cemetery was in 1882, that of my great great grandfather, and I have no objection to the graves and remains of those who were interred over 75 years ago being dug over and made available for new burials. This would include the grave of my brother for instance, who died in 1945. Doing this will ensure that local people will be able to bury and mourn their dead close to home, something I believe is the caring and compassionate decision of both the Local Authority and I hope, the Church.

[nxjen]

Laura: The Collins dictionary defines a troll as someone who posts "deliberately inflammatory articles on an internet discussion board". There is only one person on this thread who has done that.

[dbboy]

You say you put an injunction into the Church Court yesterday and that they do not want to proceed, oh I wonder why!!!!!!!!

If you want to present an injunction you need to do as Sidhue has detailed above, but you won't.

The figures and dimensions you state continually change, it's a real shame you cannot be consistent. Your whole approach to this matter has been brash and attention seeking. The council continue to not engage with you because of the approach you have taken to date. I am truely surprised the council have not served an injunction on you for the liable language in your posts on here and in your tweets about the council. Here's hoping their legal people start to take action about the behaviours you have displayed.

[edborders]

I have posted that the Council will be

cutting down 12 acres of woods, including trees on One Tree Hill

mounding over or digging up 1000s of graves

removing the headstones and monuments of 1000s of graves

burying the newly dead on top of the remains of other dead

digging up the newly buried in 75 years

as part of their burial strategy to keep the cemeteries open.

I have also posted that the Council are saying that all of this is for the benefit of local residents.

If you think the Council's plans are the right thing to do then what I have posted shouldn't get you upset.

News video of grave reuse plans: https://youtu.be/0eklxkk30bQ

Lewis Schaffer

Save Southwark Woods.

Write to the Church

Richard Hastings, Clerk to the Registry:

[email protected]

Philip Petchey, Chancellor to the Diocese:

[email protected]

Paul Morris, Diocesan Registrar

[email protected]

[Loz]

edborders Wrote:

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> cutting down 12 acres of woods, including trees on One Tree Hill

12 acres? That does not match the council documents. Prove it.

> mounding over or digging up 1000s of graves

Thousands? That does not match the council documents. Prove it.

> removing the headstones and monuments of 1000s of graves

Thousands? That does not match the council documents. Prove it.

[geneie]

I have now received a reply from Richard Hastings, the Diocesan Registry Administrator. He says he will "ensure it is placed before the Chancellor during his consideration of the matter".

At least he will know there is support for Southwark's plans.

[Sue]

Do you know what the timescale is for writing, geneie?

[BrockleyRising]

Although I favour cremation, not least to save space, I guess some prefer burials. If they need more land why do they need to remove trees completely from some areas. Why not clear lost of small areas within the woods rather than whole swathes? That way, when you look up the hill from HOP, you would still mainly see trees and the headstones would be mostly hidden.

[Sue]

I guess because only a relatively small part of the hill is a dedicated cemetery?

[geneie]

I'm afraid I don't have a clue, Sue - it was just reading the nonsense from SSW on here this morning spurred me into action, they even kindly supplied three email addresses, lol

[Sue]

geneie Wrote:

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> I'm afraid I don't have a clue, Sue - it was just

> reading the nonsense from SSW on here this morning

> spurred me into action, they even kindly supplied

> three email addresses, lol

OK thanks, I'm going to do the same, I guess nothing is likely to happen over the weekend.

[Loz]

BrockleyRising Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> If they need more land why do they need to remove trees completely from some areas. Why not clear lost of

> small areas within the woods rather than whole swathes? That way, when you look up the hill from

> HOP, you would still mainly see trees and the headstones would be mostly hidden.

Ah, you've believed the SSW people's hype there. The council's FAQ page on the changes explains better:

Q: I heard that you are cutting down 12 acres of woodland, is this true?

A: No. The Council are not cutting down 12 acres of woodland and any such claims are untrue.

Currently we only have two projects that are agreed for implementation that impact upon wooded areas:

Area Z and Underhill Boundary improvements works at Camberwell Old Cemetery

- The entire area of both sites is 3.12 acres but, by no means, is all of this covered in trees

- We plan to remove 19 significant trees in total

- Following redevelopment of the site we intend to plant 60 new trees

Area D1 at Camberwell New Cemetery

- The entire area of site is 0.54 acres and, again, not all of this is covered in trees

- We plan to remove 26 trees

- Following redevelopment of the site we intend to plant, at least, 25 new trees

Rather significantly different to the vastly overbloated claims being made, no?

[Sue]

Very interesting, Loz.

Edborders, what do you have to say about those figures? Are you suggesting that the council is lying? Because if not, it looks very much as if - well, let's just say you have got your figures wrong.

[edborders]

You find a whole cooked chicken in Peter John's fridge. He promises that he is going to eat just one leg (it's not the nice leg, either) and says he has no plans at this time to eat the rest.

Sorry, but Peter John is gonna eat the whole chicken.

Lewis Schaffer

Nunhead

[Otta]

LauraW Wrote:

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> I love Camberwell Old Cemetery and the rest of

> Southwark Woods because I've had many hours of joy

> there. It's great that so many people are putting

> in their time and energy voluntarily to save green

> spaces and habitats from being rendered into the

> kind of sterile burial plots

London is around 50% green space. There is plenty of green space and trees to enjoy for one city. All that this is about is a bunch of entitled people thinking they should have the right to demand this and that.

It

is

a

CEMETARY

It is not "southwark woods", because "southwark woods" only exists in your imagination.

The point of a cemetary is burials, not to be a nice spot for a walk.

What is up with you people?

I seriously could have gotten behind a petition to tidy up the cemetary but leave it largely preserved. I don't agree with burial. But your "campaign" is a joke and Lewis has done it so much damage I'm starting to wonder if he's a double agent.

He;s definitely loving the attention.

[edhistory]

edhistory Wrote:

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> Report of the emergency meeting?

That's the meeting at 7:30pm on 26 January at The Herne.

[edhistory]

LauraW Wrote:

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> to save green spaces and habitats from being rendered into the

> kind of sterile burial plots

This "sterile" is puzzling.

There is plenty of "ecological" and "habitat" activity below ground level.

[Loz]

edborders Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> You find a whole cooked chicken in Peter John's fridge. He promises that he is going to eat just

> one leg (it's not the nice leg, either) and says he has no plans at this time to eat the rest.

>

> Sorry, but Peter John is gonna eat the whole chicken.

So, in other words, all the stuff you've claimed the council is going to do with the cemetery is based on absolutely nothing but your own fevered imagination?

If I was someone who bought into your campaign, I'd be feeling VERY pissed off right now. You've lied to them all, haven't you?

[kiera]

Loz quoted from the council's website -

"- We plan to remove 19 significant trees in total

- Following redevelopment of the site we intend to plant 60 new trees"

Sue asked "Edborders, what do you have to say about those figures? Are you suggesting that the council is lying?"

The answer is it all depends on how you define a tree. The council are using very different standards according to whether they are referring to felling trees or planting trees. So, when the council say that only 19 trees are to be removed, they are only counting trees with a diameter of over 150mm. Anything smaller is included as scrub. However, when referring to new trees they are to plant, they are referring to trees of 14-16mm diameter. If they used the same standard of 150mm, they could not claim to be planting any trees. Many more trees than 19 are to be felled.

Extract from the tree survey in the planning documents

"Detailed (measured) survey of all trees where set in dense vegetation is not always possible ............. In the case of woodlands or substantial tree groups, only individual and accessible trees with stem diameters greater than 150mm are usually plotted"

http://planbuild.southwark.gov.uk/documents/?GetDocument=%7b%7b%7b!RJlwBh45WSKmsD25Hfirbw%3d%3d!%7d%7d%7d

[Penguin68]

Maybe someone (hopefully unbiased) could explain what proportion of the substantial (over 150mm diameter) trees now growing in the area to be landscaped are to be removed, and what their replacement policy is to be (what type of tree to be replaced by what (other?) types of trees). How many (if any) of the trees being removed are being removed for safety or other 'practical' reasons (i.e. they now offer some threat because of disease or damage or too close-growing to other trees or are now considered an inappropriate planting for the site?)

By the way, the fact that the council does not intend to replace mature trees with mature trees, but to plant saplings (presumably the right saplings in the right places) to grow is a natural part of landscaping and tree management. Indeed it is good management to have staggered ages of trees to allow for succession. If you are dealing with trees, you deal with the long-term. That is normal and good practice. 'Instant gardening' is not, normally, necessarily consistent with 'good gardening' - and mature specimen trees are phenomenally expensive.

[Sue]

edborders Wrote:

-------------------------------------------------------

> You find a whole cooked chicken in Peter John's

> fridge. He promises that he is going to eat just

> one leg (it's not the nice leg, either) and says

> he has no plans at this time to eat the rest.

>

> Sorry, but Peter John is gonna eat the whole

> chicken.

>

> Lewis Schaffer

> Nunhead

This is absolutely bizarre. Bizarre in the extreme.

So basically, you have based your whole campaign not on the council's actual plans for the areas in question, but on what YOU IMAGINE they are going to do?

What really concerns me is that all the people who are supporting your campaign must not have done the smallest bit of research for themselves but have just blindly believed your (what appear to be) outright lies, and that you've got them to write to the council, sign petitions and God knows what.

I suppose we should be relieved that you haven't persuaded them of something much more serious involving live people.

You've really wasted a lot of people's time, haven't you? Not to say made yourself look extremely foolish.

[Hassie]

EDB appears to be doing a fantastic job of picking away at any credibility that he and his chums may have had. "Vexatious Litigant" springs to mind.

[Penguin68]

The really sad thing about all this is that there is a good case to be made that Southwark's plans need oversight and attention to make sure that (1) they do (just) what they have announced they will be doing and that (2) their planned replanting makes sense in terms of ecology and of changing climactic conditions (for whatever cause). Orderly control and oversight of what should be an orderly process is paramount for what are (for those on either side of this debate) important local public spaces.

But this has been diverted by hyperbole, spin and half truth such that attention to what the council is actually planning and doing has been lost in contemplation of the very worst things it would be possible for any authority to do; with those who do care about the spaces, as cemeteries, having to fight stupid battles against ill informed supporters of what is (undoubtedly) a very heart felt, but also, frankly a very personal campaign by someone with an entirely different agenda to most of us. I want the best for the cemeteries, he wants no cemeteries.

[nxjen]

They've got so caught up in their own spin and hyperbole they've lost sight of their original aim.

[henryb]

>

> This is absolutely bizarre. Bizarre in the

> extreme.

>

> So basically, you have based your whole campaign

> not on the council's actual plans for the areas in

> question, but on what YOU IMAGINE they are going

> to do?

No the strategy documents says what the plans are. In that all 12 acres of the current wooded areas are to be developed, as is an open grass/meadow area and the old nursary site, after that will start grave reuse which by definition involves exhumation.

No one is imaging anything.

The current phase is to develop 2 areas of the 8 or 9 areas that will eventually be developed.

The council are now trying to spin that they are only planning to develop these 2 areas and not the others. If all the the other areas and exhumation is now off the table as they seem to be now saying publicly. Then lets see the new strategy document. What happens when these two areas get used up in a 3 odd years time?