Secrecy and murk cloud Ark Elvin planning application

A resident asks on the Brent Planning Portal whether the frontage of the new Ark Elvin school building will be as in the artist's sketch above, which is on the documentation to be considered.

The short answer appears to be 'no' if one refers to the Wembley Area Action Plan:

W5 Copland School and Brent House

(4 hectares)

Mixed use development on the High Road frontage with new / rebuilt school to the rear.

The ground floor on the High Road frontage should be commercial retail development with associated car parking.  Residential development either above or adjacent to the retail should include a high proportion of family housing.

Development of the school to the rear of the site should accommodate, if possible, an additional form of entry on current capacity.

The scale of new development near to Cecil Avenue should respect the adjacent suburban character.

Car parking on the retail site should have shared use for town centre parking. There should be an active retail frontage with servicing off Wembley High Road. Access from Cecil Avenue will be limited to residential access only.

In the event of the school not coming forward as part of a joint scheme, proposals may be brought forward for the Brent House site as a standalone development.

This seems to be yet more misleading information.  The frontage is likely to be occupied by housing and shops. The reason why access  to the building site through the Brent House site (high rise on the High Road, top centre) is that the Council does not want to disrupt the disposal and regeneration of  its property.

Meanwhile it is worth looking back at the discussion atwhat  was then the Brent Executive when the proposals came up for discussion. Muhammed Butt declared an interest as the parent of a child at what was then Copland but soon to be Ark, and not as a governor which he is now.

Jean Roberts, speaking for teachers at Copland and local residents  opposed the land transfer: (Extract from Minutes)

With the consent of the Executive, Jean Roberts representing teachers of Copland Community School and residents, addressed the meeting and spoke against proposals to expand the school on to adjacent land involving a land transfer. She referred to the terms of title deeds, covenants and Rights of Way which could prohibit the scheme and also the intention to grant a 125 year lease on the final school site to ARK Schools (ARK) to whom the school was due to transfer as a sponsored academy on 1 September 2014. Seamus Sheridan also addressed the meeting and expressed concern over the lack of proper consultation over the proposals and restrictions on speaking rights at a public meeting. He stated that children and residents were against the expansion proposals which would result in a loss of land used for play.

Rights of Way was raised at this early stage and although Fiona Alderman has ruled the application can go ahead with the Rights of Way being dealt with separately it is mentioned in the Application.

Demolition of existing buildings on site and erection of replacement building to

accommodate a three storey 9FE secondary school for 1750 pupils (1350 11-16 year

old and 400 post 16) with associated car parking, servicing and circulation space, Multi

Use Games Area, All Weather Pitch, games areas and other hard and soft landscaping,

together with the diversion of Public Right of Way (PROW) No.87

 Public Right of Way to be realigned to border the eastern end of the MUGA and widened to 3.4m (currently it separates the school building from the playing fields)

It seems strange that the POW forms part of the application but cannot be admitted as a material planning consideration.

At the Executive Meeting many reports were withheld from public scrutiny and designated as 'restricted' LINK

Although Wembley Central and Tokyngton ward councillors made no comments at the consultation stage I understand that two Wembley Central councillors are down to speak tonight. Muhammed Butt (sorry that name keeps popping up) is a Tokyngton ward councillor.

Currently the land is on a short-term lease from Brent Council to Ark but on completion of the new build would be handed over to them on a 125 year agreement.

Ark Elvin: Butt accused of misrepresenting residents' views

 

Satellite view of the Ark Elvin site

In an exchange of emails a Wembley resident has accused Brent Council leader Muhammed Butt of misrepresenting their views on the Ark Elvin Academy planning application due to be heard at tonight's Planning Committee.

The allegations concern a meeting between Butt and residents on the site at the weekend.  In an emollient letter Butt said:

At the meeting I was glad to hear from yourself and all the people present  that you were not against the development of the school and that you understood that the new school will benefit the local area in helping to shape the demand for school places, so that children will not have to travel far from their homes. The current school building is in a poor state of repair and the new proposals will deliver a high quality facility that will enhance the learning environment for the students and in conjunction with the new management team at Ark Elvin under the leadership of the Head Annabel Bates, we will improve the life chances for those students.

Butt is on the governing body of Ark Elvin.

Responding Chetan Patel wrote:

I'm surprised and concerned with regards to your email reply, which is wholly inaccurate, untruthful and misleading. 

I would like to record, I didn't say I was in support of the planning application. This is very well documented in my numerous correspondence, which you have also been copied into. Please confirm if you want me to resend all my correspondence opposing the planning application to yourself.

You also stated all the residents at the meeting were in support of the scheme. This statement also completely wrong. The residents only agreed the school required modernisation. None of residents at the meeting agreed with the proposed Planning Application, which adopts Jesmond Avenue for construction access traffic.

I can also confirm the residents have never been invited by Kier (the developer) or the council to participate in two discussions with regards to mitigation of construction impact. We have only ever been told what will be imposed upon us. It feels more like a dictatorship.

If you feel my record of this meeting is still incorrect, we can have this debate again at the Planning Committee meeting on the 22nd October 2015.

I'm very disappointed in your email and I hope the Planning Committee are not unduly influenced by Muhammed Butt's poor recollection of this meeting.

Patel, who is due to make a delegation to the Planning Committee this evening, has also been involved in an exchange with Fiona Alderman. Referring to his claim that the Planning Application was not valid because it did not deal with the issue of a Public Right of Way across the playing fields Alderman wrote:

The assessment of such claimed cannot be carried out by the Planning Committee and must instead be dealt with by a separate process by Transport Department. My view is that there is no impediment to the Planning Committee considering and determining the application.

 Chetan Patel replied:

There are legal procedures which apply when rights of way are affected by development. Development is defined in the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 as “the carrying out of building, engineering, mining or other operations in, on, over or under land, or the making of any material change in the use of any buildings or other land”. The Act says that, with certain exceptions, planning permission must be obtained before development is carried out.

The Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) has guidance (refer to section 48.d, attached) for local authorities on the validation of planning applications. The guidance states that applications for full planning permission should be accompanied by a plan of the proposed development showing all rights of way crossing or adjoining the site. I believe the claimed ‘Public Right of Way’ by myself any other residents by way of the 20 year easement period, should be shown on the Planning Application, but is missing from the Planning Application ref 15/3161.

If an application for planning permission affects a right of way (claimed Pubic Right of Way) then a special rule applies and the application must be advertised at the proposed site and in a local paper. This is an materially important so residents can make comments about them.

This means that, while the existence of a right of way across the site of a proposed development won’t automatically mean an application is rejected, the fact that it is there must be taken into account by the officer or committee which decides the application.

 The Planning Committee is at 7pm this evening at Brent Civic Centre.

Ark Elvin accused of Wembley 'land grab'

The site (Chetan Patel)

Local resident Chetan Patel has launched a campaign on what he sees as a 'land grab' from local people of the playing fields behind Ark Elvin Academy  (formerly Copland High School) in Wembley.

The school is due to be part of a large redevelopment LINK.

In a letter to Annabel Bates, the Ark Elvin Headteacher, Chetan Patel said:

With respect to ARK's planning application (ref 15/3161) for the school redevelopment, I believe your proposal breaches the community's 'Public Right Of Way' onto the existing fields in accordance to Highways Act 1980 Section 130A.

The community has had access to the existing park without any objections from ARK or from the previous management of Copland Community School for many decades now. The law assumes that if the public uses a path without interference for some period of time – set by statute at 20 years - then the owner (ARK) had intended to dedicate it as a right of way.

ARK's proposed development of the school can only be described as 'land-grab' with no consideration for the community users and the Law.

I ask ARK to respectfully withdraw its poorly conceived planning application before a decision is made by Brent Council.

If ARK still wishes to pursue the development, which displaces community access to the existing parks (see Appendix A), I will be forced to pursuing legal advice on this matter, at further expense to the tax payer.

I believe the general public has right to know how many hundreds of thousands pounds if not millions have been wastefully spent to date on this poorly conceived project.  Under the Freedom of information Act can you please confirm how much money has been spent in relation to the proposed re-development works of the school.

I had hoped to communicate the aforementioned to you at the recent 'exhibition' meeting held at the school on the 15th July 2015, but you had failed attend this key meeting. It's very disappointing that the school's own head teacher, a key stakeholder, could not be bothered to attend this key meeting.

Annabel Bates replied:

Thank you for your letter, dated 22nd September 2015, about the planning permission that has been submitted by Kier Construction to rebuild our school.  I was present at the consultation on 15th July so I am sorry I did not manage to speak to you in person.  I am of course happy to meet with you to discuss your concerns.

The land shown in the appendix to your letter has always been occupied by Copland, and now Ark Elvin, as it is school playing fields rather than a public park.

As you may be aware, since Ark took over the school we have been making a concerted effort to keep the school playing fields secure and stop the unauthorised access to this private land.  We have repaired the fence a number of times (despite it being repeatedly cut through), moved on any rough sleepers, cleared up the rubbish at the London Road end of the playing fields, engaged a landscaper to cut the grass and carried out regular litter picks so it can be used by pupils for sports.  I cannot comment on how this area was managed by Copland Community School as neither I nor my senior management team worked at Copland.

I am unable to respond to your Freedom of Information Act request as we are not party to that information.  This project is being funded by the Education Funding Authority so you will need to contact them with your request.

Wembley Matters covered the initial plans when they were first published and the article elicited many comments LINK

Chetan Patel is campaigning on several fronts including an official complaint about what he alleges are the failures of Brent's Planning Enforcement Team in the matter as well as a referral to the Local Government Ombudsman,