We know that many of our local residents in Wimbledon, Southfields, and West Hill are continuing to follow the development of proposals from the All-England Lawn Tennis Club closely. We have each met with local residents, leaders of local Residents’ Associations with the Chair and CEO of the All-England Lawn Tennis Club, and held public meetings on this issue.
We both agree on the importance of protecting our local green spaces, responding to the climate emergency, and carefully and rigorously scrutinising all proposed developments that will impact the communities we represent.
We therefore jointly object to the AELTC planning application for building an 8,000 seater stadium and 38 temporary use grass courts on Metropolitan Open Land. Local residents appreciate the existing world class sports event in our area, however there is strong local opposition to these plans. The new area of Wimbledon Park is a small part of the development which will not have any protection against future development and will be mainly closed to the public for at least 5 weeks each summer. The size and mass of the new show court stadium is of an inappropriate scale to be built on Metropolitan Open Land.
We therefore request that when Merton and Wandsworth Councils considers the application, they hold a special full planning committee to discuss only this issue, and we urge both Councils to reject the proposal.
We will both continue to work with our residents in Putney and Wimbledon constituencies, and with the All-England Club, to find a proposal that meets our criteria for a positive development for everyone.
- Wandsworth Planning Consultation can be found here and closes on Tuesday 2nd August.
- Merton's Planning Consultation can be entered by emailing planning.representations@merton.gov.uk with the reference number 21/P2900. It closes on Monday 15th August.
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