The proposed sale of the Sefton Park Meadowlands has been the subject of controversy since it was first announced by Liverpool City Council in 2013. The land, which lies alongside the Grade 1 listed Sefton Park in South Liverpool, has been earmarked for development with housebuilder Redrow planning to build a selection of luxury homes. But campaigners say the Meadowlands are an integral part of the park and should be treated as such.
While Redrow says it’s too early to comment at this stage, Your Move spoke to Councillor Ann O’Byrne, cabinet member for housing and Janet Pell, vice chair of Save Sefton Park Meadows campaign to hear both sides of the dispute.
Councillor Ann O’Byrne, cabinet member for housing
The land at Park Avenue has been called Sefton Park meadows but, in fact, is not part of the park. It is outside the park’s boundary designated by English Heritage.
That being said it is still a green space. So why has the council decided to sell it for housing?
The sale of this land will provide a much-needed financial boost for the council – at a time when the city is under the most severe budgetary pressure it has probably ever experienced. The proceeds will be invested in projects that benefit the city.
Not only will the sale itself generate funding but the type of houses we want to see built there will provide a continuing important source of revenue for the city and its residents. Liverpool has an acute shortage of executive houses. Most of its property is the lowest council tax bands, meaning that the amount we raise in council tax is below that of many other local authorities. We need to increase the amount we receive in council tax which can be used to protect services. This means we have to have more houses in the higher bands and the reality of the situation is that these will only be built on sites such as that at Park Avenue.
Of course, we are building on Brownfield sites too – there are numerous schemes taking place to provide affordable decent homes. But we need the right mix of housing to help to the city thrive.
And let us not forget that the fringes of Sefton Park were originally designated for housing.
Of course, we understand the passion which people have to keep green space. But let us put this piece of land into context. It is a 2,62 hectare site. Across the road from it is Sefton Park which has 104.75 hectares. Within a mile is 226 hectares of open spaces. This site represents 0.04% of the city’s green space.
Its loss has to be balanced against the potential of bringing forward a scheme, subject to the normal planning procedures, which can be used for the good of the whole city.
Janet Pell, vice chair, Save Sefton Park Meadows
Sefton Park Meadows is featured within the Title Deeds of Sefton Park and has always been considered part of the parklands.
Having said that it is an historic green space in its own right that has strong design and landscape features which reflect and are part of the Sefton Park design – including the grand entrance to the park from Queens Drive where there’s a unique double row of Lime trees.
The Meadows are protected within the existing Unitary Development Plan and that is still the document that will be referred to for the planning application.
The Meadowlands is part of Liverpool’s green infrastructure, it’s within Sefton Park conservation area and it’s part of Liverpool’s wildlife corridors. All of these are planning documents that the city council has developed and used for many years. None of that has changed. There has been no review to say the Meadows are no longer protected by any of those documents.
While the council may argue that the area is small, in comparison to the park, are we really going to sell land to developers on the basis of its size regardless of its protections, its location and its heritage? The council is calling the Meadows ‘incidental open space’ – normally when that phrase is used in council documents it refers to a leftover piece from a development – anyone who visits Sefton Park Meadows knows you cannot classify it as incidental open space.
There are 110 trees on that so called small area – most of which are mature or semi-mature trees and have tree protection orders on them. All of these are at risk. Even those that are not cut down for building work will be severely at risk because of the construction, their roots will be damaged.
The houses that Redrow is planning to build will be bespoke houses, the experts in planning and development that we’ve spoken to say they’ll be selling for around £1 million. I’m don’t know where Mayor Joe Anderson is getting his figures but I’m not sure that there’s a significant demand in Liverpool for houses of around £1 million. There is a demand for social housing and housing for first-time buyers and there are plenty of Brownfield cites around the city for this.
The planning authority will be meeting once Redrow has put in its planning application and we would like as much notice as possible of that so people can start to put in their points of view.
We’ve fund-raised around £2,500 so far to pay for a planning consultant from outside of Liverpool and we really need to carry on fund raising because we’re going to fight this right to the end.
Joe Anderson is not listening to Liverpool over loss of greenspaces. He needs to.
