The Brent chapter of London Citizens rallied in the open space outside Willesden Green Library on Saturday as they launched a 100 Days of Peace. The 100 days refers to the 50 days of peace that were observed between warring groups before and after the ancient Olympic Games that allowed athletes to get to the games safely.
Following last year's riots and recent violent crimes London Citizens aim to create 'CitySafe Zones' where the community works together to provide safe havens. There were speakers from many local schools and organisations, including a Year 2 pupil and Cllr Muhammed Butt, leader of Brent Council expressed his support for the scheme. Former MP Dawn Butler was also in attendance.
Willesden Green is one such safe space so it was ironical that the rally was being held somewhere that will disappear if the proposed redevelopment. of Willesden Green Library Centre goes ahead. Instead of being on the high road and open to view, the replacement open space will be behind the new building and over-shadowed by the new flats. It will be in shadow most of the day and shoppers will not be able to see it from the High Road. Many local people think that it will be far from safe.
An allocation has made been to register the open space as a Town Green or Town Square. It is not yet clear what impact, if any, the application will make on the redevelopment plans.
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| The rally from Wembley High Road |
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| Muhammed Butt addresses the crowd | |
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| The crowd represented Brent's diversity |
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| Can we afford to lose this public space? |
4 comments:
Those wooden obstacles cluttering the space look like they are deliberately put there to debilitate the open space in the same way that the council has degraded the library centre, cinema, cafe and car park. They are nothing but clutter. They were part of some so-called story-telling installation. I have never seen anybody sit there listening to the stories, which, thank God, are no longer droning from the speakers. Another dirty trick played on Willesden by the Brent tyrants. Bring back Willesden council, dissolve Brent. Freedom for Willesden!
Jeez, you people are paranoid.
Space is waste. People don't need space. People don't need study space, or meeting space, or benches or fountains. Don't be silly. People don't need libraries or historic buildings. What people need is kennels, as many as can be crammed together. People will not pay you for historic buildings, libraries or space. What they will pay for is kennels. They will pay you to visit their kennels, to live in their kennels, to service their kennels. Space, pah!
Nothing paranoid about wanting to keep a community meeting place and preventing an outside developer erect a cheap ugly industrial building in its place. All so that he can profut from flat development crammed into a small space over a private underrground car park. Wake Up, Look around you.
Martin
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