Lea Marshes   LVRPA

User forum September 2012

(19/Sept/2012) A Walk On the Tame Side Filter Beds and Walthamstow Marshes User Forum, Wednesday September 19, 2012. It started with a petition, opposing the development of Porters Field (Leyton Marsh) handed in by Caroline Day (of Save Leyton Marsh) and received by Martin Page, LVRPA greenspace manager. Next Martin Page was asked what happened to the extra August meeting he'd proposed. Apparently it had to be cancelled: there were too many holidays! Well, who'd have thought people would go on holiday in August, especially at a time when many people were getting out of the area to escape the Olympics! The tour itself was quite depressing. Every idea involved some form of development, as if LVRPA is desperate to concrete over every inch of lea marshes and is doing so slowly by stealth. The first idea was to move the gates! The ice rink is such a brutal building even LVRPA wants to soften the entrance. But instead of actually improving it, LVRPA wants to move the entrance gates even further into the marsh, diminishing the size of the marsh and making even more of lea marsh look brutal! Next let's screen the ice rink. That idea seemed even more ludicrous since even fast growing trees would take several years to mature and we are promised that the ice rink is soon going to be demolished and replaced by two new ice rinks. Not only that but the area chosen for the screening has been used for storage of heavy equipment in the past. Screening would probably prevent this use in future. There was some suggestion that perhaps the waterworks could be used but that would be tricky since it's on the other side of Lea Bridge Road. Neither of these ideas got much support but there was disagreement about the next item: some kind of bridge or steps up to the sustrans from the path running over the borough boundary (at the point where it crosses the line of Black Poplars. It was pointed out that LVRPA had earlier talked of a path running though the paddock at the rear of the riding centre. In the context that a new sandy path was created alongside the row of hybrid black poplars, some, though by no means all, felt this might be a good idea. Finally, it was propsed that some kind of artwork might decorate the railway bridge running over Sandy Path. Of course, there already has been a number of such created on an unofficial basis. Some felt that there could be an official graffiti project, but Martin Page was of the opinion that graffiti puts forward the wrong image. Oh dear! It seems like walks are going to get tamer!