Author: hillside gardens park

Dear Resident,

The Friends of Hillside Gardens and the London Borough of Lambeth have been working in partnership with Turkington Martin Landscape Architects to develop a masterplan to direct investment of £500k into the redevelopment of Hillside Gardens. The funds have come from local s106 developer contribution agreements.

The proposed investment will:

• Enhance accessibility throughout the park with improved footways
• Refurbish the childrens’ play area
• Improve surfacing and boundary fencing of tennis and multi-use games areas
• New furniture and signage throughout
• New static fitness equipment for adults and older children
• Planting and soft landscaping.

The proposed masterplan has been informed by a working group of Friends and an extensive survey of park users undertaken by the Friends during the summer of 2019.
Feedback from the survey has been incorporated into the final design. You can view the
proposed masterplan design on the park notice boards or on the Friends of Hillside Gardens and council websites.

Play area

It was agreed during the master planning process that the childrens’ play area needed
investment to enhance this already well designed and popular facility. The project team
appointed Kompan to develop a proposal. The proposed design retains key pieces of equipment including the large climbing unit and bank slide. The proposal includes improving the safety surfacing throughout and replacing old features with new enhanced equipment with higher play value. The draft plans can be viewed on notice boards in the park or here and here (see also previous blog posts).

Your comments are invited on the children’s play area and the wider masterplan proposals. Works are expected to commence on the refurbishment of the footways in the park at the end January 2020 and are expected to take 1 month. 

Playground works are programmed to start in early March with completion in the Spring. Improvements to the court boundary fencing and surfaces will be undertaken on a phased basis after April 2020.

Please forward any comments or questions you have to Rob Kelly, Lambeth Project
Manager on rkelly2@lambeth.gov.uk by the 3rd of February 2020.

We look forward to hearing your feedback.
Tom Stanbury
Chair
Friends of Hillside Gardens and Palace Road Nature Gardens

We would like to know which surface you would most like to have installed during the upcoming park’s development. The idea is to find out which court surface is desired and whether to have one or two different types of tennis court surface/s. The information below gives a brief summary of the characteristics of the four most popular tennis court surfaces used in Great Britain. You can click HERE to do the very quick two questions survey.

Description and some of the Pros & Cons of four different court surfaces

1) Artificial Clay
Description:
1. Slow-Medium speed. 2. Medium height bounce. 3. Almost uniform trueness of bounce. 4. Sliding footing. 5. Non-slip traction. 6. Medium to soft shock absorption.
Advantages: 
1. Surface provides the highest number of playing hours throughout the year. 2. Surface is not affected by frost or freezing conditions. 3. Suitable for junior coaching and liked by junior coaches. 4. Low cost replication of real clay playing characteristics, i.e. slow pace / medium bounce.
Disadvantages:
1. Player maintenance before or after playing session. 2. Weekly drag brushing by club staff is an essential requirement. 3. If localised problems exist it is harder to patch repair the surface. 4. Surface requires raised kerbing to prevent clay infill from migrating outside the fence line.

2) Porous Asphalt
Description:
1. Slow speed. 2. High bounce. 3. Almost uniform bounce that decreases with age. 4. Firm footing. 5. Non-slip traction. 6. No shock absorption.
Advantages:
1. Low capital cost to construct. 2. Low maintenance costs over lifespan. 3. Hard and robust playing surface. 4. No court user maintenance required.
Disadvantages:
1. Firm surface can be heavy on players joints. 2. Slow pace / high bounce. 3. Surface can soften in early years during summer. 4. Poor aesthetics where repainting is left too long.

3) Artificial Grass
Description:
1. Medium Slow-Very Fast speed. 2. Medium-Low height of bounce. 3. Variable trueness of bounce. 4. Generally firm, can have partial sliding footing. 5. Mainly non-slip but can be variable traction. 6. Mostly reasonable shock absorption.
Advantages:
1. Soft surface under foot. 2. Allows play in most weather. 3. Not affected by puddling. 4. No court user maintenance required.
Disadvantages:
1. Fast pace / low bounce. 2. High maintenance requirements. Weekly input from club staff. 3. Potential for freezing during winter. 4. High cost of reinstating if facility is poorly maintained.

4) Impervious Acrylic
Description:
1. Medium Slow-Fast speed. 2. Medium height bounce. 3. Uniform trueness of bounce. 4. Firm footing. 5. Non-slip traction. 6. Shock absorption is hard to moderate depending on if cushioned.
Advantages:
1. Good slip resistance qualities. 2. Low maintenance of the surface once installed in that only the upper surface of the court needs to be re-coated and you don’t need to replace the tarmac. 3. Durable surface with a long lifespan. 4. Good playing characteristics.
Disadvantages:
1. Un-usable during periods of wet weather. 2. Hard under foot. 3. Surface has a non porous sub-base, therefore a larger cross fall may be required to assist the drainage of the courts. 4. Perimeter drainage around the court block will be required regardless of the gradient.

Click HERE to do the very quick two questions survey.

Thanks,

(Serious About Tennis)

Dear Friend,

another lovely meeting full of ideas and progress is in the books. If you missed it, here are the minutes that tell the story. The next meeting is on Monday, September 16 (7:30 – 9:00pm) at St.Jude. Come along!

Andreas

You may or may not know that Lambeth has allocated a large amount of money to improve the park (more information here and here), providing us with the chance to improve the park for everyone. The council has started the process and a team of landscape architects has sketched out some first ideas. Now we want to know what you think about them, and what is missing.

Click here to start a short, 5 min survey to tell us what we should try to achieve with this money.

There is also a survey specifically for young people! If you are aged between 12-18 please complete this alternative survey.

The more people tell us what they want, the more impact we can have on the process; your opinion matters. We will also have a table at the Hillside Sports Day (May, 18th) if would want to talk to us in person. We are ready to listen.

Each year the Friends of Hillside Gardens Park (i.e., we) are organising a day of free fun and activities for the whole family: The Hillside Sports Day. And each year, it is growing and getting better and better. The aim of the day is not only to provide the people around Hillside Gardens Park with a day full of free, organised sports activities, but also to bring the community together. Come along even if you do not like sports at all, there is something for everyone. Let me point out some of the highlights below, but if you are impatient, click here to book a session.  Booking is not needed, but some sessions are so popular, that booking them might be a good idea. Here are all the events, below more information.

Turn Trash to Treats: On the day before the sports day (Friday, 17th of May, 18:00), we will make the cleaning of the park in preparation for the big day a bit more fun. Come along, collect some trash (bags and gloves provided), and get cake, brownies and more in return. Fun for the whole family.

Tennis: As usual, we have a lot of great tennis opportunities for the very young (Toddlers, 9.30) to adults (taster session: 11:00), to everyone in between (Minis 10:00, Juniors, 11:00). Not matter whether you are good or bad, you will enjoy this tennis session led by our dream team of instructors, Rosena and Dino (book here ).

Theatre: For the first time , we will have an arts and drama workshop for children 5 years and younger. Let by the inspiring and experienced Mhairi Grealis from Clip Theatre. Bring your future Oscar winner at 10:00 to the One O’Clock Club and watch the magic enfold. Click here for more information. 

Social Tea: Our chair, Tom, organised this amazing event. His goal is to bring the people in the park together, to have a moment to chat and get to know each other, whether you like sport or not. So he convinced Emma’s, a local real estate agent for many years (here) to provide free tea, coffee, and cake. We are all hoping very much to meet you there.

There is so much more, Yoga and Netball will be popular as every year. And I might try to play some rugby for the first time in my life. And for most of us, the highlight of the day is seeing the kids run in the races at the end of the day.

We hope to see you there, have a chat, and get to know you.

Dear Friend,

the wonderful Cath Raitt wrote a comprehensive report summarizing all the important things that happened at the last public consultation. We are very grateful for all the input we got from the fantastic people that came along and for Cath writing this report. You can read the report here. And below are two pictures of the wonderful ideas brought up at the meeting, summarized in the report as well; a little sneak preview. Read more about the last meeting, including more pictures of the meeting here.

On the evening of 25^th March over 30 people gathered in the church hall of St Simon and St Jude on Hillside Road. The purpose of the meeting was for Lambeth with the working group from Friends of Hillside of Garden Park to present the plan for the park.

There is just under £600,000 to be spent on the park by way of the community infrastructure levy charge which Lambeth have raised from the developer of the London Square development on the High Road. Our local councillors successfully ensured that the money would go to the park.

At the start of the meeting the working group introduced themselves, Tom Stanbury (Chair), Nigel Duckers (Minutes Secretary), Dino Skeete (Serious About Tennis), and Cath Rait (representing the residents of Palace Road Estate).

Rob Kelly is the project manager from Lambeth and Joe Todd from Turkington Martin the landscape architect. Rob introduced himself and the work done to date in respect of establishing the priorities for the park. It was made clear that this a first proposal to be revised further.

There are 4 areas of focus for the park,

• Sports Services and Facilities
• The existing building and WC block
• Existing Park Infratructure
• Entrance and Signage

Joe then presented the sketchbook for the park, this can be found here. The sketchbook highlights design opportunities. The highlights include a well-defined circular walking route; re-locate tennis courts 3 & 4 to the Multi Use Games Area’s to have a bank of 4 tennis courts; a new football pitch on what is currently court 4; continuous planting of hedgerow around the park boundary to improve biodiversity; an area for young adults to include a climbing wall of skating area.

Nigel then directed the cluster groups to discuss the likes and priorities for the park. And then the dislikes if any, followed by new ideas people would like to see happen.

There was overwhelmingly positive sentiment in the room with a definite desire as a priority for the tennis court surfaces and facilities to be upgraded. Several people explained how the tarmac area by the gym is used by families and young children and wouldn’t want to lose this to a skate park. There was concern about giving up too much space to dogs and their walkers.

At the end of the meeting there was enthusiasm to see a café in the park, with former Chair Tony Emerson explaining this has been explored in the past. However, many did think with putting in the infrastructure for a coffee cart or mobile kiosk would be a sensible move as the park becomes more popular in the years ahead.

The meeting closed with Rob explaining that he and the working group would be back to present further at the end of May beginning of June. Thank you to all who attended it was a positive atmosphere in the room with all constructive contributions.

Hi ,

for those who couldn’t come, or those who want to review what happened, here at the Minutes of our last meeting:

FOH Minutes March Meeting.

Talk soon, Andreas

Hi,

our next Friends meeting is on the first Monday in March. The meeting will centre around the plans for the park and how the incoming money should be spend. Rob Kelly (Lambeth Project Manager) will present plans and ideas. Please come along and have your say in shaping the future of our wonderful park.