AELTC urged to withdraw Wimbledon Park Planning Application and start afresh

For those who thought that the AELTCs plans to build all over Wimbledon Park Golf Course had been done & dusted, they haven’t been.

They’ve just got more & more complex.

Initially – in summer 2021 – they filed 101 documents in support of their application.  Then – in May 2022 – they filed 60 more.  now – this autumn – another 20 or so have appeared.  With so many subsequent amendments and corrections, substitutions, and additional material, it is now totally unclear what set of documents actually forms this application. 

For instance, some of the documents filed this year are entirely new.  But it is not at all clear how they intersect with the original documents from last year.  Part of the problem arises from the AELTC’s use of different consultants to produce different documents and reports which over- (or under-) lap and in many cases restate the same proposition with a different slant.  Merton’s consultant makes this point, too.  There are no tracked changes to the documents that have been amended.  We can find no single overarching document that brings all the documents together.

Therefore we have written to Merton’s planners suggesting that the AELTC should now withdraw their flawed application and start afresh with a new application that is complete, coherent and which addresses the deficiencies highlighted by Merton’s consultant in the present application.  Preferably it should also address the widespread local opposition to the current plans by not turning Metropolitan Open Land into an industrial tennis complex.

You can read our letter here.