Camden News: Parliament Hill School | New Road | Hampstead Heath | Sheila Gibbons | Rachel Evans | City of London

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Camden News - by DAN CARRIER
Published: 5 March 2009

Say No To The Road campaigners Jonathan Futrell, right, and Stephen Greensted deliver their petition to the Heritage Lottery Fund with fellow protesters

School says new road on the Heath will put pupils in danger

‘Students have been knocked over – now they want to create more dangers’

PARLIAMENT Hill School has waded into the row over whether a new road should be built on Hampstead Heath.
Deputy headteacher Sheila Gibbons and head of PE Rachel Evans have both written letters to Heath managers the City of London and to the Heritage Lottery Fund saying they believe the new route, planned to run from Gordon House Road up to the Parliament Hill staff yard, would be dangerous to pupils who would have to cross it regularly as they attend PE lessons on the open space.
Mrs Gibbons said: “Our school already faces onto Highgate Road which is enormously busy. There have been incidents of students being knocked over and now they wish to create the same dangers at the back of our school.”
Her views were included in a detailed dossier put together by the Say No To The Road group, handed to the Heritage Lottery Fund on Friday.
The City of London have applied to Lottery bosses for a grant of more than £3million to improve Parliament Hill Fields. The money will be spent on shoring up the foundations of the Lido, building a new café, a new changing area and pavilion at the running track and landscaping the Highgate Road entrance. They also plan to convert buildings in the staff yard into new offices for the Heath’s management team.
Say No To The Road campaigner Ros Bayley said: “People know instinctively that converting a footpath to vehicle use is wrong and won’t sit by and let it happen.”
At the top of Say No To The Road’s 15-point dossier is the issue of protecting Hampstead Heath from development.
They say that building the road will work against one of the main stated purposes of the bid, which is to improve the access to the Heath for people from the more deprived communities to the south. The dossier adds: “The real purpose of the road is to service new Corporation offices to be built on the Heath.”
A City of London spokesman said: “The plan is to make Hampstead Heath a safer place by taking service vehicles away from the pedestrian paths they must now use and put most of them on a discreet route along a very short part of the edge of the Heath.”

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