Campaigning for a new Events Strategy
Many Friends are enthusiastic festival goers, but we know that a small historic urban park is not the right place for the country’s largest pop festival.
The park can clearly support large gatherings and has done so successfully in the past. But enclosing almost all of the amenity grassland for six weeks of the spring and summer, and then leaving it unusable until the autumn deprives local people of a precious and unique resource and the long term damage to trees and other natural capital is known to be catastrophic.
In the last few years, the previous Council administration has taken an idiosyncratic approach to planning to push through large and long festivals without taking the concerns of local people seriously.
Campaigning together
We have worked alongside local groups, particularly the tireless Protect Brockwell Park to prevent the misuse of a planning loophole. This year, for the first time, the commercial event promoter had to apply for planning permission which led to noticeably better protection for the park.
We hope to collaborate with the new Green administration as they develop a new Events Strategy in line with their commitment to stop the privatisation of public space.
