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To: Cllr John Cotton, Leader of South Oxfordshire District Council, Didcot Garden Town Initiative

Save Didcot's Amenities and Green Spaces on Ladygrove!

UPDATE - 15/03/17
It's official - Didcot's Ladygrove Park is saved! No Tech Campus, no flats, no 50% gone. Yippee!

There's still more to do to make sure its a permanent reprieve, but now is a time to celebrate and for me to thank you all for your support. So come down to the park and enjoy yourself - you've earned it!

Please promise to protect all of Didcot's green spaces, paths and amenities on Ladygrove from loss, shrinkage or relocation through future development.

Why is this important?

After signing this petition please formally object via http://didcot.space (will redirect you to the Garden Town plan page) or send an email to [email protected] Comments can be as short or long as you like - just make it clear you object to building on Ladygrove Park. Consultation on these proposals has been extended to 28th February, so please do it now. Thank you!

There are plans for 15,000 new houses to be built in Didcot as part of the "Didcot Garden Town" project. This is more than those planned for Bicester Garden Town, recently described as a "dog's breakfast" with ecologically important flower rich meadows being lost to housing.

Proposals for Didcot have been announced that are WORSE than first feared. They include building technical office space and accommodation over roughly half of the Ladygrove recreation ground and play park. The remnants would be developed such that there would be no substantial level open green space for casual sports or recreation. A new road cutting across the play park and flats on the play park, opposite the Willowbrook and behind the football club with no additional parking serve to top of this awful proposal. The current morning congestion around the primary school would be intolerable. Our facilities, green spaces and paths integral to our local parkrun are threatened.

You can see the briefings here : https://didcotgardentown.commonplace.is/news/2017/01/20/stakeholder-representative-group-presentation-19-january-2017

Campaigners in Bicester have been to court twice to try to protect their environment. If we are to protect our green spaces and amenities the time to act is now, by obtaining a simple undertaking from the project team before their plans are fully formed. If you want to save them please sign this petition and share it with your friends.

Thank you!

(You can see the Ladygrove areas initially marked out for development on the final pages of these two official downloads published by the Didcot Garden Town planners http://www.southoxon.gov.uk/node/18434 and this http://www.southoxon.gov.uk/node/18447 )

Didcot

Maps © Stamen; Data © OSM and contributors, ODbL

Links

Campaign Facebook Page Campaign Website

Updates

2018-05-29 16:17:39 +0100

Petition is successful with 2,067 signatures

2017-03-16 14:23:21 +0000

Petition is successful with 2,054 signatures

2017-01-30 16:05:55 +0000

1,000 signatures reached

2017-01-30 13:26:21 +0000

Please log your official objections this week, well ahead of the 24th Feburary deadline.

It takes just two minutes :-)

See http://www.saveladygrove.com/p/quick-objection-guide.html

2017-01-23 01:48:43 +0000

Thank you so much to everyone who turned out for the demonstration at the Conerstone on Thursday, especially the little ones who made their own banners. Well done kids!! Also to everyone who wrote to their councillors.

What has been proposed is far WORSE than we ever thought possible when this petition was launched. The plan calls for building flats and a tech campus where our sports, recreation and nature park now stands. It feels like a betrayal of Didcot and the very idea of a Garden Town.

The formal Garden Town Masterplan consultation starts on Monday 23rd january. However I would urge everyone to please please WAIT before commenting on it. We are all angry but we want our feedback to be taken seriously and counted properly. That means having a good look over the actual master plan first for it's weaknesses, not just the slides already released, then circulating some suitable words to everyone. Thank you!

2017-01-19 00:30:22 +0000

It would seem that our fears were well founded. While we have been telling the Garden Town Team loud and clear that we want our green spaces protected they have been secretly planning to build offices, houses and roads over them all along. The draft master plan shows roughly half of Ladygrove park being bulldozed. Gone - just like that! There will be less green to live our lives in and extra traffic trying to reach offices that have no parking spaces because people will presumably travel by hot air balloon. These are buildings that could easily be accommodated in the new builds on the edge of town.

A garden town really does seem to mean building in your garden.

Please see https://www.facebook.com/SaveLadygrove/ for the latest updates.

I hope to see as many of you as possible outside of the Cornerstone at 5:45pm tonight, Thursday 19th January.

2017-01-02 21:13:11 +0000

500 signatures reached

2016-12-29 18:13:19 +0000

The local press are interested in this campaign. Please come along if you can to the mound overlooking Ladygrove play park on Monday 2nd at 11:50 for a photoshoot with the local paper. We could be on next weeks front page!

https://www.facebook.com/events/191565707981490/?ti=cl

2016-12-27 23:06:47 +0000

The great response to this campaign in such a short period has been amazing. I can't thank you all enough. To help people understand at a glance what could be lost to the development of "Area 9" (as the Garden Town team call it) I have put together a composite picture showing what's at stake and included it in a new Facebook page for this campaign. Please have a look at the image on the page and share or like it. Thanks!

https://www.facebook.com/SaveLadygrove/

2016-12-26 14:59:04 +0000

100 signatures reached

2016-12-26 10:17:52 +0000

50 signatures reached

2016-12-26 08:56:08 +0000

25 signatures reached

2016-12-26 08:32:41 +0000

10 signatures reached