Comments(0) Steyning Parish Council has arranged a public meeting for 3.00 pm on Saturday 28 January 2012, at the Steyning Centre to discuss their proposal for a concrete skateboard facility in Steyning’s Memorial Playing Field (MPF).
There has been considerable discussion of a skateboard facility in Steyning for more than a decade including a Parish Poll on 28 September 2000 which resulted in a majority vote against the provision of a site on the MPF. On 19 December 2006, the Steyning Parish Council Playing Fields Committee concluded the top of the MPF was the wrong area to create a skateboarding site due to its isolation in case of accidents. The Parish Council conducted a household survey of residents March 2011 which found that almost 70% of the 680 residents responding favoured a site opposite the Leisure Centre on Horsham Road rather than a site on the MPF.
The Lib Dem Focus Team has long campaigned for a skateboard facility in Steyning but believes any site must be away from large concentrations of residential housing and near public amenities. It therefore regrets the Parish Council’s decision to propose the MPF as the only possible location for a skateboard facility, especially given the known lack of support for this site registered in the March 2011 survey and the previous public opposition highlighted in the 2000 Parish Poll.
During 2011 the Parish Council commissioned a noise assessment report which concluded “with all mitigation measures in place it is likely that some residual skate park activity will still be audible … due to the nature of the activity being significantly different in nature to the existing noise climate (in the MPF)”. Unlike the noise from other users of facilities in the MPF which are during relatively short periods of time, the noise from skateboarders could be at all times of the day and evening. Many houses surround the MPF and the Rublees Allotments would be immediately next to the proposed site.
Whilst noise is certainly a, if not the, major consideration, the Focus Team believes there are additional arguments against a skateboard facility in the MPF:
1. The MPF is a place of natural beauty - many residents, including those not living nearby, want to preserve the environmental and visual beauty of the open green field on the edge of the South Downs;
2. As the Parish Council noted in 2006, the MPF site is not close to first aiders and public amenities;
3. The necessary external funding for the proposed skateboard park will be difficult to secure if the proposed site does not command the widespread support of the community.
The Lib Dem Focus Team believes that youth in Steyning deserve to be supported. However, we oppose the location of a skateboard facility in the MPF for the above reasons. We believe a fuller consideration of another site, opposite the Leisure Centre, continues to offer the most feasible way for a skateboard park coming to fruition in Steyning.
For further details, please contact the Lib Dem Focus Team: Nick Hopkinson on SusNickH@aol.com or tel :01903-813013

