CAMPAIGNERS have called on Cotham School to work with them to resolve the continuing row over Stoke Lodge playing fields.
The We Love Stoke Lodge group says an agreement could avoid the expense of a planned eight-day public inquiry in October over public rights of way across the 22-acre site.
A spokesperson said: “The community is shocked and baffled at how Cotham School continues to conduct matters relating to Stoke Lodge. So much of the waste of its educational resources in the last decade could have been avoided if the school leadership had been prepared to work reasonably with the community to share this heritage parkland (in line with the terms of its lease). Even now, the school could save significant costs (for example, avoiding the costs of the public inquiry) by simplv fencing a smaller part of land that it barely uses anvway.”
The two sides have been at loggerheads for more than a decade over the fields. The site us owned by Bristol City Council and since 2011 has been leased to Cotham School, which does not have its own sports pitches.
The school fenced off the whole Stoke Lodge site for a second time at the end of last year, following a high court judge’s decision to overturn a council decision to grant the land status as a town or village green.
Cotham School pupils have since returned to Stoke Lodge for some games lessons and after-school football sessions.
However, weeks before the judge’s ruling, a city council committee had confirmed four public rights of way across the site. Cotham School has challenged this decision so the government’s Planning Inspectorate will hold a public inquiry, beginning on October 6 at City Hall, about whether the footpaths should be legally registered.
The matter was discussed at the council’s public rights of way and greens committee on April 9.
Campaigner Alan Preece told councillors: “That fence is spiky at the top. At some point, some child is going to slip and perhaps get those spokes through their throat. Or maybe lose their finger, like happened at Coombe Dingle many years ago. The school ought to be warned that they would be held responsible if there was that sort of injury.”
Sandra Fryer, chair of governors at Cotham School, told the meeting: “We were delighted at the school to return to using the school playing fields. It’s brilliant to see young people there enjoying the fields, exercising and learning.
“We deeply regret the ongoing continuing removal of fence panels, the criminal damage to our property, and the ongoing challenge of people walking on our fields and refusing to leave when staff arrive at the start of the school day. We even had somebody filming our students and a member of staff, and they refused to go away. The fields are vital to the school.”
The school says the fence is needed to keep pupils and staff safe during termtime and to deter vandalism of the fence. It is now on its second attempt to install eight tall poles for CCTV cameras on the site. In the meantime, it is using three mobile CCTV units, even though these have been ruled unlawful.
The gates to the site were open throughout the Easter holidays but on the eve of the return to school there was a new twist: several of the school’s signs were spray painted.
A school spokesperson said: “The metal signs cost a considerable amount to have made and put in place. Cotham School has clear CCTV footage of the criminal carrying out this vandalism, and we are working with the police to identify that person.”
Includes reporting by Alex Seabrook, LDRS