|
|
 |
| |
Under-threat Hampstead Police Station stays open
RESIDENTS in Hamsptead celebrated this week at the news their under-threat police station will not be shutting down after all.
Instead, the grade-II listed building in Rosslyn Hill will be refurbished after no other suitable premises could be found, Camden’s police chief told a Camden Community and Police Consultative Group meeting on Tuesday.
Borough commander Mark Heath admitted that “finding alternative premises in Camden is really hard to do”. He said improving the existing station had proved the “preferred option”.
Mr Heath added he wanted “to provide facilities the people of Hampstead deserve” with the same level of service as at newer stations such as Holborn.
Last October Mr Heath announced plans to close down the station because it was “unfit” for modern policing. It followed revelations that the station would go as part of cost-cutting measures in the force.
Residents first campaigned to save the station in 2002.
Nigel Steward of the Hampstead and Belsize police panel said the decision was what “residents knew all along was the best option.” He said: “Property in Hampstead is so expensive that anywhere large enough would have been unaffordable.”
Hampstead Tory Councillor Mike Greene said: “We said we would accept the decision if the police could come up with a better suggestion. But it would be impossible to come up with as sizeable and authoritative a building as we have now, nor one as accessible to all who use it.” |
| |
|
|
|
