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We congratulate all those involved in the Save King’s Stairs Gardens’ campaign on their successful application to register this land at Rotherhithe as a town or village green.

The group submitted the application to the London Borough of Southwark, the greens registration authority, in August 2011, with supporting evidence of local people’s use of the land.

King’s Stairs Gardens is maintained by the Borough’s Parks Section and is approximately three hectares. The land is owned by the council who did not object, but it raised queries about whether the land had been acquired as open space, which would have prevented it from being registered as a green. In fact, no evidence was found to clarify for what purpose the land had been acquired.

On 25 January 2012, the Council Assembly, on the recommendation of the Strategic Director of Communities, Law and Governance, agreed to register the land as a green, protecting it for ever more.

Says our case officer, Nicola Hodgson: ‘The group worked hard to put in a high-quality application for the green, and it is wonderful that the land will now be protected for enjoyment by future generations.’

‘Southborough Common is a jewel’, says Kate Ashbrook, our general secretary. Kate visited the Kent common on 8 February and then spoke at a public meeting organised by Kent High Weald Partnership which is consulting local interests on the future of the common.

‘Common land is immensely special,’ says Kate. No other land type has such public value—for their flora and fauna, archaeology, history and culture, and for public enjoyment. Commons have remained undisturbed through history and are a wonderful survival of a past way of life when people depended on the local common for grazing their animals and collecting wood for their hearths.

‘But with so many interests in the common, they are at risk of becoming battlegrounds when an owner proposes to introduce a new form of management.

‘We strongly commend the approach taken by the Kent High Weald Partnership, with the landowner Southborough Town Council, in consulting local people about what they value about Southborough Common, what the problems are and how they might be resolved. The Partnership has followed the Open Spaces Society’s guidance in seeking a consensual solution and not rushing into making changes.

‘Southborough Common is loved and valued by those who live nearby and enjoy it regularly for quiet recreation. It has immense nature conservation interest too.

‘We feel confident that all those who care for the common will be able to agree and implement a plan for its future and provide a model for commons management for others to follow,’ says Kate.

We have joined a consortium with the Campaign for National Parks, Campaign to Protect Rural England, Friends of the Lake District and many others in support of plans to extend the boundaries of the Lake District and Yorkshire Dales National Parks. This will ensure that the magnificent countryside, much of it common land, between the two parks is designated, including the northern Howgill Fells. Natural England has signed variations orders which need to be confirmed by the environment secretary.

Please write in support of the variations, before 16 March 2012. The easiest way is via CPRE which produces a template for you to email to Defra and your MP.

If you prefer you can write to Defra, Protected Landscapes Team, Zone 1/09, Temple Quay House, 2 The Square, Temple Quay, Bristol BS1 6EB, or send an email.

Further information can be found at Natural England and Friends of the Lake District.

Congratulations to Kent County Council, the access authority, for going to court to restore forbidden land to the public. The council took Mr John Button, owner of the historic Capel Battery on the clifftop at Capel-le-Ferne, near Folkestone, to the magistrates’ court, after he blocked off public access to the site. The land had been mapped as open access land under the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000, giving the public the right to walk over it.

The landowner fenced off the site with a six-foot-high barrier, preventing people from walking there. After trying, and failing, to negotiate with the landowner, the council took him to court, which ordered that the obstructions must be removed within 60 days.

Kent County Council is the first access authority to go to court to get illegally-blocked access restored. It sets a fine example to other access authorities.

Local OSS member Angela Godfrey says: ‘‘It’s great that, after we’ve waited patiently for nearly two years, something might be happening to restore our access here. But the campaign isn’t over yet and we shall be keeping a close watch to ensure the barricades really do go.’

We are delighted that the Department for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs (Defra) has announced that the first stretch of the England Coastal Path will be open this summer. The first section of route starts at Rufus Castle in Portland and will end at Lulworth Cove, both in Dorset, and covers 32km of coastline along with spreading room away from the path. The Environment Minister, Richard Benyon, has pledged that the route will be open in time for the Olympic sailing.

We are delighted that the first stretch is to be opened soon and look forward not only to the next five stretches* being completed but also to Defra giving the go-ahead for the creation of the path and accompanying access land right round the English coast.

Read more here.

*Cumbria – Whitehaven to Allonby
Hartlepool/Durham/Sunderland – North Bents (Whitburn Bay) to Seaton Carew
Norfolk – Weybourne to Sea Palling
Kent – Ramsgate to Folkestone
Somerset – Minehead to Brean Down near Weston Super Mare

We have joined campaigners fighting to save the magnificent view from Richmond Hill. This view is threatened by a high-rise residential block as part of the redevelopment of Twickenham station. The objectors include the Twickenham Residents’ Action Group, TRAG.

View from Richmond Hill with proposed block superimposed Photo by John Watson and Landmark Architecture

Richmond Council has accepted a proposal from Network Rail and Solum Regeneration for this development.

The society championed the Richmond Hill, Petersham and Ham Act 1902, which aimed to protect the view from Richmond Hill. The society had previously (c1896) helped to defeat an Inclosure Bill which would have led to the destruction of Petersham and Ham Commons.

Says Kate Ashbrook, our general secretary: ‘The Open Spaces Society was instrumental in saving Petersham and Ham Commons for the public and preserving the view from Richmond Hill. Over a century later, we shall fight just as hard to protect this same view from a high-rise development.’

We have written to the Mayor of London and the Secretary of State for Culture to urge them to adopt a much lower alternative, which is popular locally and will preserve this splendid view.

We are dismayed that the Secretary of State for Environment, Food and Rural Affairs has granted Southern Gas Networks permission for a gas installation on Broad Street and Rydes Hill Commons, near Guildford in Surrey.

Southern Gas applied to the environment secretary in 2008 to place a gas installation on the common, replacing an existing one which is in a less contentious location. The Planning Inspectorate, on behalf of the environment secretary, decided in January 2012 that the works would not do any material harm to the relevant interests in the common, ie people having rights there, and the interests of the neighbourhood and the public. The public has the right to walk and ride over the whole area, under section 193 of the Law of Property Act 1925.

Says Bob Milton, the Open Spaces Society’s Guildford representative: ‘We are dismayed that the Planning Inspectorate, using its powers, has ridden roughshod over public rights, to facilitate financial savings for a utility company, without recognising the obstruction of public access to both walkers and riders on this area of common land.’

We have backed our member the Kensington Society and other local societies⁽¹⁾ in calling for the council’s planning guidance to recognise the land surrounding the Natural History Museum as a local green space that is open to the public.

The lawns, photographed by a member of the Kensington Society in early 2011, are in the same state in early 2012 after the whole area had been covered to allow for temporary structures and vehicles.

We sent the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea a strong submission that the council’s Supplementary Planning Document must recognise the East Grounds, and in particular the East Lawn, at the Natural History Museum as local green space.

It is vital that this important and popular land is given the recognition it deserves as green space.  This neighbourhood lacks open space for the enjoyment of local people, office workers and visitors, and the green lungs around the Natural History Museum and the other Kensington museums fulfil a vital function.

Says Michael Bach of the Kensington Society:  ‘The Council’s proposed planning guidelines fail to understand the important role of the East Grounds, and especially the East Lawn, not just as an important part of the setting for the Natural History Museum, but as a vital local green space—the only one open to the public in this densely built-up area.

‘The museum has, over the last six years, increasingly used the East Lawn and East Grounds for “temporary” commercial events, often back to back, so that this green space is not freely open to the public for a very large part of the year, after which the lawns may be damaged and need to recover or even be returfed.  We asked the council to use the guidelines to manage the scale, frequency and, above all, the duration of these temporary events—it has not done so.

‘The museum is now considering paving over this vital local green space.  The loss of this space, by paving it and then using it more intensively, amounts to the effective loss of this publicly-accessible open space,’ says Michael.

1.         The objections to the Royal Borough of Kensington and Chelsea’s proposed Supplementary Planning Document on the Natural History Museum Grounds Design Guidance were coordinated by the Kensington Society on behalf of the Brompton Association, Earl’s Court Society, Knightsbridge Association and Onslow Neighbourhood Association.

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.