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Evening NewsMon 14 Aug 2006
Will the space race put pressure on our green and pleasant land?
GINA DAVIDSON (gina.davidson@edinburghnews.com)
WIND nipping at your ears, knees turning red in the cold, and sheer exhaustion sapping the strength from your legs as the muddy turf beneath your feet weighs down your attempts to run.
Ah, yes, playing team sport on grass pitches - a distant memory for one generation and an undreamt-of horror for today's children used to playing on smooth all-weather surfaces - that's if they play sport at all given the nation's obesity crisis.
But that could all be about to change. While the selling-off of playing fields creates a knee-jerk response about the loss of precious open land, in recent years, the pay-off has been that while developers build houses, they'll also provide some kind sports facility, such as Astroturf pitches, in return.
However, a new planning policy launched for consultation by the Scottish Executive last week suggests that kind of trade will no longer be good enough. It seems that Astroturf pitches which have to be booked before they can be used don't qualify as open space.
It's a radical concept and one which the green lobby has welcomed, but could it ultimately put more pressure on other kinds of public open spaces - and even Edinburgh's much-prized green belt? Communities minister Malcolm Chisholm is certainly adamant that green space which is valued and used by the public has to be protected, in the main to ensure the health of the nation. As a result councils will now have to undertake an audit of all open spaces in their area and consult with the public about how they are used before they are classed as valuable or not.
Sportscotland will also have to be consulted on any project leading to the loss of sports facilities - not just large playing fields, but tennis courts and bowling greens, too. The organisation is delighted with the policy, which places a presumption against development on valued open space.
Chairwoman Julia Bracewell says: "Attractive and accessible open spaces are important in encouraging people from all ages and backgrounds to adopt more active lifestyles. We firmly believe this new policy will help to safeguard access to open space and ensure a better deal for sport and physical activity."
Greenspace Scotland, a national body of which Edinburgh Green Belt Trust is a founder member, is also delighted with the policy.
But while senior development officer Deryck Irving believes that Edinburgh is a step ahead with its parks and gardens strategy, which has seen the council pledge more than £5.6 million to be spent over the next three years on more than 60 separate projects, he says more needs to be done.
"The council's strategy deals mostly with formal spaces, so the next step is to look at the small spaces which people pass on their way to work or which are round the corner from where they live. The value people put on these spaces may be much greater than the council does.
"Also, the idea that new sports facilities with artificial pitches can replace open space will have to be looked at again. Removing open space and replacing it with something where there is control over when it can be used is not addressing community need."
Certainly, the campaigners at Meggetland may well wish such a policy was in place when they were fighting the housing and sport facility development there. Similarly, those campaigning against the development of a new high school on Portobello Golf Course or the building of homes on Liberton Drive will take heart that more protection is being placed on open land.
Another who believes the policy is a step in the right direction is Edinburgh council's Liberal Democrat leader Jenny Dawe, who is currently battling to ensure that public land behind Forrester and St Augustine high schools is not sold off for housing.
"With any luck, given that the sell-off of the land at Forrestines is some way off, it might end up being protected by this new policy," she says.
"Also, the idea that building new schools with new Astroturf pitches to make up for the loss of land is just not on. For a start, there will be fewer pitches and everyone knows how difficult it can be to try to access these pitches. They don't have a community use in the same way open land does."
She adds: "The Forrestine situation is in limbo at the moment but the council has taken the decision the land can be used for housing which already goes against its local plan."
The city's planning chief, Councllor Trevor Davies, is not convinced, though, that by putting constraints on open land in the city, the green belt won't suffer.
"We already have robust policies when it comes to open space and as new developments go ahead in the city we insist that 20 per cent of the area is public open space. In this way we're creating new parks in Muirhouse, the Waterfront and at Fountainbridge.
"But we've got to distinguish between valuable open space and empty space where there are just weeds growing and which nobody uses. It's all about getting the balance right, and that means there is always a trade with these situations be it saying to yes to a development if we get investment in new sports facilities.
"What this policy may well do is put more pressure on the green belt. If they don't build in the city, they build on the green belt. If you're going to be able to have affordable housing, that's what's going to happen."
Deryck Irving, however, has a more utopian view. "Perhaps we will soon be seeing old buildings demolished and then the land not being wholly rebuilt on, so more open space is created, rather than constantly being lost," he says.
COMMUNITIES VERSUS BUILDERS AS OPEN FIELDS TURN INTO BATTLEGROUNDS
DEVELOPER Applecross fought a ten-year battle to secure permission from the Scottish Executive to build 170 new homes on playing fields. The scheme went to a public inquiry but was backed by the Scottish Executive in 2003 on the grounds of the "significant" benefits to the local community that had been pledged by the developer, including around £9m worth of improvements to sports facilities in the area.
• Furious opposition by locals over loss of a golf course, pictured right, parkland and football pitches, part of which would be used for housing to fund the building of a new Portobello High School, led the council in May to include more potential sites as options.
• Land at Forrester and St Augustine's high schools has been deemed "surplus to requirements" by council chiefs and there are plans to sell it off to fund the building of a road depot.
• Proposals - described by one MSP as "monstrous" -by developers Hart Estates to build between 60 and 120 home on greenbelt land at Liberton Drive went to an inquiry in May.
Related topic
This article: http://edinburghnews.scotsman.com/features.cfm?id=1183022006
Last updated: 14-Aug-06 11:40 BST
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