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We are relieved that a development which threatened the footpath leading to the famous Poohsticks Bridge in Ashdown Forest is to be removed.

Mr and Mrs Ben Van Praagh of Faircote Hall and stud, at Hartfield in East Sussex, had been given retrospective planning permission for a new riding arena which crossed the public footpath leading to the bridge. The consent, which had been opposed by OSS, Sussex Ramblers and other organisations and individuals, included a requirement for the path to be lawfully diverted within two years.

Now the Van Praaghs have put in an application for planning permission for a smaller arena which does not cross the path.

We are pleased that the new planning application is smaller and will ensure the path is kept open on its current, historic, route.

With the Ramblers and others we have said that the path must be kept open and unobstructed to its full width at all times, except for any strictly-temporary closure during construction. We have also specified that there must be appropriate landscaping and screening, the impact on the area of outstanding natural beauty must be minimised, there should be no lighting nor public-address system, and the old arena must be completely removed before the new one is constructed.

This is an attractive part of the country and it should be saved from suburbanisation. And above all, we want to see the popular ‘Poohsticks Path’ used and enjoyed by walkers in its lovely setting.

We welcome the news that the High Court will review Bristol City Council’s decision to register only part of the 42-acre site at Ashton Vale, Bedminster, as a town or village green. The application for judicial review was made by the Save Ashton Vale Environment (SAVE) group.

Bristol City Football Club wants to build a 30,000-seat stadium here.

On 16 July 2011 the council’s Public Rights of Way and Greens Committee agreed to register as a green only 17 of the 42 acres that had been recommended for registration by an independent inspector, Ross Crail.

Ms Crail, who presided over a public inquiry in the summer of 2010 recommended on 26 August 2010 that the whole of the application site should be registered, as the evidence in support of the application satisfied the statutory criteria.

Says our case officer, Nicola Hodgson: ‘The High Court will now consider whether Bristol City Council properly considered all the relevant issues.’

Nigel Moorcroft, chairman of Long Ashton Parish Council which supports the application for judicial review, says: ‘We welcome the judge’s decision that SAVE’s request for a judicial review has merit. Arguments will be presented for Bristol City Council’s decision to be reversed and for the whole of the site to be awarded protected status as a town green.’

If the land is registered as a town or village green it cannot be developed.

Bromley Council plans to sell the unique Italian Garden, an open space on the south side of Queen’s Gardens, so as to build restaurants there.

We are backing our member, the Friends of Bromley Parks and Gardens, in opposing the scheme.

Says our South London representative, Mark Green: ‘If the land is sold and restaurants and cafés built here the land will cease to be open space available for the public to enjoy. The development would be a private, not public, amenity.

‘We consider the development here is contrary to Bromley’s own policy in the Bromley Town Area Action Plan which says that: “New cafés and restaurants will be permitted around the edge of the garden provided that development does not result in the loss of any green space”. While the site is paved rather than green, it is nevertheless public open space, and to interpret the policy as permitting such development here would contradict the overall thrust of local and national planning policy.’

The Italian Garden was added to Queen’s Gardens about 20 years ago to compensate for the loss of another part of Queen’s Gardens in the redevelopment of Bromley town centre. Continues Mark: ‘Allowing the disposal of this site now would be contrary to the spirit and intention of the original land swap’.

‘Furthermore, the site forms part of a conservation area. The proposed development is contrary to the requirements of development in a conservation area, namely that it should preserve or enhance the area.’

We are also objecting to the planning application for development of the site.

We have opposed plans by the Secretary of State for Transport to stop up a 26-metre width of public highway adjacent to 94-102 Bell Street in Henley-on-Thames.

The proposed highway-closure is to enable Chesterton Commercial to construct parking spaces here. We were among the objectors to the plans for car parking on the green space, which South Oxfordshire District Council approved last July.

We don’t consider it necessary to stop up the highway merely to park cars here. We do not anticipate permanent parking on this land and it is wrong to close a public highway, and deny people their right to use it, purely for private gain.

This is a pleasant, leafy corner of Henley, it is a small green space and a crucial element in the attractive townscape. It should not be reduced or despoiled by permanently parked cars.

So we hope the transport secretary will decide not to close this public highway.

We are challenging Stowe School’s golf course plan.

With the Bucks, Milton Keynes and West Middlesex Ramblers, we have objected to the posh public school’s scheme to move its existing north Bucks golf course onto land crossed by public paths, and have submitted our objections to Aylesbury Vale District Council, the planning authority.

The proposed golf course will be slapped down right on top of public paths. There are three bridleways and four footpaths either crossing the site or in its immediate vicinity. The enjoyment and safety of walkers, riders and cyclists will be severely affected.

This is a tranquil and beautiful part of Bucks, where people should be able to exercise their rights peacefully in unspoiled countryside. Indeed, flying golfballs so close to those enjoying public highways may constitute a public nuisance.

We commend the submission from Buckinghamshire County Council’s strategic access officer. As highway authority, the county has a duty to protect the rights of path users and it has urged the district not to grant permission for this golf course in its current form.

Says our general secretary, Kate Ashbrook: ‘Stowe School with its arrogant motto “I stand firm and I stand first” (Persto et Praesto) should rethink its proposals and decide not to stand firm in pursuing this obnoxious application. As a leading public school it should set an example by respecting the rights of the public to enjoy the public paths’.

‘So our message is: Stow it Stowe and withdraw your plans,’ Kate concludes.

The year 2012 marks the centenary of the death of Octavia Hill, an early activist of the Open Spaces Society.  Octavia became involved in the society in about 1875 shortly after her unsuccessful campaign to buy the fields between Swiss Cottage and Hampstead in west London.  She joined the committee of the society, urging it to enlarge its scope to include ‘the acquisition and dedication to the public of open spaces in or near London’.

The society was then known as the Commons Preservation Society, and its luminaries included George Shaw-Lefevre (later to become Lord Eversley), Sir Charles Dilke MP, Leslie Stephen and many other Liberal reformers.

Octavia Hill is well known for her advocacy for open spaces—‘open-air sitting rooms’ as she called them—but less so for her defence of public paths.  At the society’s annual meeting in 1888 she seconded a motion, proposed by Lord Thring, calling for the society to approve ‘the bill for the better protection of footpaths and roadside wastes as prepared by a committee of the society … and that the society be requested to act as the centre of advice for local footpath societies in relation to the subject’.

Octavia spoke of how the ‘little winding, quiet byways with all their beauty’ were vanishing, ‘closed by quarter sessions, the poor witnesses hardly daring to speak, the richer dividing the spoil, the public from a larger area hardly knowing of the decision which has for ever closed to them some lovely walk’.  She referred to the entrance to paths ‘concealed by judicious planting, lodge gate, or hidden doors’ or of a path ‘robbed of all its charm by the erection of high, black, pitched fences which … have robbed it of all its amenities’ becoming ‘unsafe as well as unpleasant.’ …

She said: ‘Take from a path the view of all but a narrow strip of sky, deprive it of the fresh air that blew across it, the view over adjacent field and you leave but a hollow mockery of a possession. … I think those little winding ways, that lead us on by hedgerow and over brooks, through scented meadows, and up grassy hill, away from dusty roads, and into the silent green of wood and field, are a common possession we ought to try to hand down undiminished in number and in beauty for those who are to follow.’

The motion, which was passed unanimously, and Octavia’s speech, indicate the society’s shift of emphasis from primarily protecting commons to embrace  public rights of way (in 1899 it amalgamated with the National Footpaths Preservation Society), and it has fought for paths, alongside commons and other open spaces, ever since.

Says our general secretary Kate Ashbrook: ‘We commemorate Octavia Hill on the centenary of her death, for her far-sightedness.  The words she spoke over a century ago still resonate today, when paths and spaces are at risk of being filched and diminished by moneyed landowners and developers.’

Octavia Hill was born on 3 December 1838 in Wisbech and died on 13 August 1912. Her first contact with the Commons Preservation Society was through Robert Hunter, our founder and secretary, and together they went on to found the National Trust in 1895.

We have called on communities throughout England to ‘get a green’ as part of the new neighbourhood planning system.

Ruddington village green, Notts. Photo: Chris Murden.

It is vital that local people identify those areas of land where they have enjoyed at least 20 years of informal recreation, before the land is threatened with development. Then they can apply to register them as greens and protect the land and their rights for the future. Once planning permission has been given it may be too late.

The new neighbourhood development plans provide a wonderful opportunity for people to think about how they use the land in their area and, if they believe they have land which qualifies as a green, to gather evidence of its use and submit an application to the county or unitary council to register it as a green.

Richard Webb and Kate Ashbrook unveil the plaque to celebrate the registration of Sugary Green, Dartmouth, as a town or village green.

Says Kate Ashbrook, our general secretary: ‘We can help you through the process. We urge you to start now. Make 2012 the Year of the Town and Village Green.

‘But the process is under threat,’ she warns. The Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, under pressure from developers, is reviewing the system for registering land as a green with a view to making it more difficult and restricted. So you need to get in now with applications based on good evidence.’

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On 1 January 2012 the Open Spaces Society gains company status, registered in England and Wales as a company limited by guarantee, number 7846516. This follows our special general meeting on 23 November where members voted unanimously that the society should become a company. The society will continue to be known as the Open Spaces Society. We remain a charity too, with the new number 1144840. We have registered our full title, the Commons, Open Spaces and Footpaths Preservation Society, as a dormant company.

In adopting the memorandum and articles of association, we have maintained as much as possible of our old constitution. The principal reason for the transfer to a company was significantly to reduce trustees’ personal liability.

We reproduce below the explanation from our chairman, Tim Crowther, at the special general meeting on 23 November.

‘Many years ago I worked for a government property agency. It was in the days when many such organisations had coats of arms. Nowadays they have acronyms and logos. Beneath the rampant beasts of my employer’s arms was the motto semper aliquid novi–translated rather freely as ‘always something new’. In case you are interested, this was an incomplete and out-of-context 2000-year-old quotation from Pliny the elder.

‘I have always thought this was a good maxim to adopt. I relish change when it is embraced positively. The OSS would not have survived for 146 years had it not changed with the times.

‘The core objectives of the society have remained intact over the years. It is the way in which these objectives are delivered that has continually been changing. The incorporation of the society is a significant milestone for us but in itself it doesn’t outwardly change anything. We shall remain a small, influential, campaigning organisation focused on what we do best.

‘One of the main reasons for incorporation is that it gives financial protection and reassurance (in the form of limited liability) to our trustees.

‘Incorporation also provides a real and appropriate opportunity and incentive for innovation and change. Change has never been faster, and it will never be slow again. The society has already embarked on that process of change. Shortly we shall have the results of the marketing exercise that we commissioned. This will provide ideas on how we can increase our membership, stimulate fund-raising, gain publicity and enhance our status. We are continually reviewing the governance of the society.

‘This county is moving towards becoming a truly networked nation. As a society, we must embrace these new technologies, by recognising the power of social media and all the powerful opportunities for online fund-raising. But let us not forget our existing loyal members who provide the platform for change.

‘And in the wider world it is improving the context in which we live that must be the underlying theme in what we do.’

We have responded robustly to an outburst from the Local Government Association today on new village greens.

Says Kate Ashbrook, our general secretary: ‘The LGA has not produced hard evidence to back its allegation that people are applying for village green status in order to block development.

‘The LGA implies that this happens frequently. In fact it is much more likely that, when developers threaten much-loved land, people realise that they have taken it for granted for too long, and want to secure their long-enjoyed rights there. They can do this by applying to register the land as a town or village green.

‘We deplore proposals by the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs, backed by the LGA, to introduce a character test, whereby only those greens which conform with a subjective view of a “traditional” green can be registered. Local people should be able to register any bit of land, however out-of-the-way or scruffy, where they have enjoyed 20 years of informal recreation, without being stopped or asking permission.

‘The LGA seems to assume that applications to register land occupied by beach huts or a car-park are false and vexatious—but local people can enjoy recreation around beach huts, and on a car-park when it is not being used for parking. It’s all a matter of fact and degree. These areas may be eligible for registration.

‘We consider that the ability to register any land where local people have accrued rights of recreation should be preserved. If planning permission has already been granted or the land identified for development in a local plan, there should be a period of grace to enable people to submit their evidence of use as a green.

‘However, we have long advocated improvements to the registration process which do not involve changes in the law. The LGA response to some extent chimes with our own proposals.

‘We have therefore written to ask the LGA for a meeting so that we can discuss our areas of agreement, and to see if we can jointly press for these improvements to the process,’ Kate concludes.