These were the bus diversion for last Sunday's morning ASICS LDNX 10K run through the area:
WEMBLEY MATTERS News and views on local politics, the environment, climate change, culture and local history
Showing posts with label Wembley Stadium. Show all posts
Showing posts with label Wembley Stadium. Show all posts
Monday, 12 October 2026
Monday, 28 September 2026
EARLY WARNING: Fryent Way & Wembley Park road closures for LDNX 2026 10k Run Sunday October 11th
Notice on Fryent Way
On Sunday 11 October 2026, the ASICS LDNX 10K returns to Wembley, welcoming up to 10,000 participants. The stadium area will come alive with music, entertainment and activities for participants and supporters. Road closures will be in place, and we are working with local authorities, TfL and emergency services to minimise disruption and deliver a safe, enjoyable event. We appreciate the support of the local community and thank you for your understanding.
Please note:
- Road closures will be in place from 05:00, with phased reopening between 12:00 - 13:00.
- During closure times, there will be no vehicle or bicycle access on listed roads, and side streets may also be affected. If you need your vehicle, we recommend parking outside the closure area.
- Parking suspensions will be in place on roads marked with an asterisk.
- Advance warning signage for road closures and parking suspensions will be installed along the route two weeks before the event.
- Bus diversions will be in place - please visit TfL to plan your journey.
- Emergency services and pedestrian access will be maintained throughout.
The route
Entertainment
Friday, 25 September 2026
Monday, 7 September 2026
Wembley Stadium events - road closures and bus diversion Wednesday September 9th and Saturday September 12th
From Brent Council
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Friday, 4 September 2026
Tuesday, 25 August 2026
Wembley Park residents' Open Letter expressing growing concerns over increased disruption associated with Wembley events
Upcoming events - note number of bus diversions and timing of road closures
This summer has been marked by an extraordinary number of concerts at Wembley Stadium following the decision of Brent Council to allow more sporting events at the stadium. A concert even supplanted a major football match earlier this month.
Since June, until today, there have been 30 concert days.
The disruption of road closures, bus diversions and route curtailments has hit the newer residents of Wembley Park as much as the longer term residents of the wider Wembley area.
Now Wembley Park Residents Association is taking up the matter with a letter to the appropriate authorities setting out the issues and potential mitigations shared in their community which they think may be of interest to the wider Wembley community.:
If you would like to sign the letter write to: Wembley Park Residents Association Committee Email: wembleypark.ra@gmail.com with your name, road or area (optional) and the date. Respond by 5pm on Monday September 7th.
In addition to transport, Event Days also impinge on Wembley Park residents in another way impacting on mobile phone signals and WiFi connections that plummet, making it difficult to communicate with friends and family
Open Letter from Wembley Residents
Request for a Review of Event-Day Transport Arrangements and Their Impact on Local Residents
Dear Sir/Madam,
We, the undersigned residents of Wembley, are writing to express our growing concern regarding the increasing disruption caused by event-day road closures and bus diversions associated with Wembley Stadium and the surrounding entertainment venues.
We are proud to live in an area that hosts world-renowned sporting, cultural and entertainment events, and we recognise the importance these events bring to the local economy and London's international reputation. We also appreciate that public safety must remain the highest priority when managing large crowds.
However, as the number and frequency of events continue to increase—particularly on weekdays—the impact on the daily lives of residents has become increasingly difficult to manage.
For many of us, these disruptions are no longer occasional inconveniences but have become a regular part of everyday life. Public transport is our primary means of travelling to and from work, attending medical appointments, taking children to and from school or childcare, caring for relatives, shopping for essential groceries, and accessing local services. On event days, bus services are frequently diverted or suspended for extended periods, resulting in significantly longer journeys, uncertainty, and lengthy walks to temporary bus stops.
The effects extend beyond commuting. Friends and family are often discouraged from visiting because parking restrictions are extensive and public transport journeys become considerably longer during events. This has a direct impact on residents' social and family lives. Working parents frequently experience delays collecting children from childcare after work, whilst older residents and those with disabilities or reduced mobility face additional barriers to accessing healthcare and other essential services.
As residents, we contribute to our community through council tax and support local businesses throughout the year. Whilst we accept that some disruption is unavoidable, we believe residents should also have a reasonable expectation of being able to travel, work and enjoy family life with minimal disruption.
Wembley is no longer simply an events destination—it is home to a large and growing residential community. We believe that transport planning should reflect both of these important roles equally.
Immediate Improvements
We respectfully ask Brent Council, Transport for London and Wembley Stadium to review the current arrangements and consider practical measures that could significantly reduce disruption while maintaining public safety, including:
- Maintaining at least one dedicated bus corridor during event days wherever it is safe to do so.
- Limiting road closures to the shortest period operationally necessary before and after events.
- Introducing resident shuttle buses connecting residential areas with Wembley Park, Wembley Central and other key transport hubs.
- Improving advance communication regarding road closures, bus diversions and alternative travel arrangements.
- Considering the impact of weekday events on commuters, school collections, healthcare appointments and other essential journeys.
- Regularly reviewing diversion routes to ensure they minimise disruption to residents while maintaining effective crowd management.
Long-Term Strategic Solutions
As Wembley continues to expand as both a residential neighbourhood and an international events destination, we believe it is timely to undertake a comprehensive review of the area's transport infrastructure.
We ask Brent Council, Transport for London and relevant partners to explore long-term solutions that better separate event-related traffic from residential traffic. Options for consideration could include:
- Assessing the feasibility of a dedicated access route, flyover or highway connection between Wembley Stadium and the A406 North Circular Road, allowing event traffic and coaches to access the stadium without travelling through residential streets.
- Reviewing the surrounding road network to identify opportunities to reduce the volume of event traffic using local roads.
- Improving traffic management systems and navigation routing so that event traffic is directed via appropriate strategic routes rather than residential streets wherever possible.
- Ensuring that future regeneration and transport planning gives equal consideration to the needs of Wembley residents alongside those of the stadium and entertainment venues.
We recognise that these options would require detailed technical studies, consultation and investment. However, with Wembley continuing to grow, now is the appropriate time to begin planning transport infrastructure that is fit for both its residents and its role as an international events destination.
Our Request
We respectfully request that Brent Council, Transport for London and Wembley Stadium:
- Undertake a comprehensive review of event-day transport arrangements.
- Consult with local residents on the impact of current road closures and bus diversions.
- Publish the findings of that review together with proposed improvements.
- Develop both short-term operational changes and a long-term transport strategy that better balances the needs of residents with those of major events.
We firmly believe it is possible to maintain Wembley as one of the world's leading sporting and entertainment destinations whilst also ensuring that those who call Wembley home are able to live, work and travel with minimal disruption.
We appreciate your consideration of these concerns and look forward to your response.
Monday, 27 July 2026
Road closures & parking restrictions Wembley Park - Tuesday July 28th, Saturday August 1st, Sunday August 2nd
From Brent Council
Bruno Mars, The Romantic Tour on following date this week:
- Tuesday 28 July
Luke Combs, My Kinda Saturday Night Tour on following dates this week:
- Saturday 1 August
- Sunday 2 August
Please read below to see how this might affect you.
Timings
- Bruno Mars, The Romantic Tour concert doors will open 7.00pm and road closures will be in place at 3.00 pm for all above events.
- Luke Combs, My Kinda Saturday Night Tour concert doors will open 7.00pm and road closures will be in place at 3.00 pm for all above events.
We expect the area around Wembley Stadium to be very busy before and after this event so please avoid the area if you can, unless you have a ticket for the event.
Event day parking
Event day parking restrictions will be in place from 8am to midnight on main roads and from 10am to midnight on residential roads on Tuesday 28 July, Saturday 1 August and Sunday 2 August 2026.
If you have a paper permit, please make sure you clearly display it in your vehicle. If you have an electronic permit, you do not need to display this.
Drink-free zone
Tuesday, 7 July 2026
Road closures, bus diversions in Wembley Park July 8,10, 11, 18, 19, 22, 24, 25 28 - My Chemical Romance & Bruno Mars
After the record-breaking 12 nights of Harry Styles, more concerts are coming up at Wembley Stadium after Brent Council granted the Stadium more non-sporting events
Wednesday, 10 June 2026
Wembley just wild about Harry! Road closures & bus diversions for 12 Harry Styles concerts - 8 on weekdays
There will be 12 Harry Styles concert dates at Wembley Stadium over the rest of this month starting on Friday June 12th and through to July 4th,
Eight of these dates are on weekdays with road closures starting at 1pm with associated bus diversions. This will impact school children travelling home from school, particularly those using the 206 bus route which will be not run south between Wembley Park and Brent Park. This also affects workers travelling to Brent Park and the industrial estates south of the stadium, including the Amazon warehouse and the Tesco and Ikea stores.
Brent Council approved the increased number of concerts at Wembley Stadium in January 2025 with 8 more major concerts a year. A major event is defined as an attendance of more that 60,000. Decision notice:
The number of major events held at the stadium in any one calendar year shall be restricted to no more than 54 (to exclude European Cup and World Cup events where England/UK is the host nation). This shall be described as the cap. Within the event cap, the number of major events involving UK based domestic association football teams shall be restricted to no more than 25. LINK
A Wembley Hill resident contacted Wembley Matters:
Does this mean that on all these days road closures and bus diversions will be active from 1pm? Doors open 5pm. Not only that I have appointment at my doctors at Wembley Park Humphry Repton Lane which is also closed on event days, my appointment is for 4.00 p.m.on Friday.Does this mean all locals using bus services 206,92,182 and 83 are again inconvenienced with either no service or diversions.
Sunday, 24 May 2026
Sunday, 17 May 2026
Saturday, 9 May 2026
Friday, 24 April 2026
Proposed Stopping-up Order near Olympic Steps – the outcome of Brent’s application to the Court on 16 April
Guest post by Philip Grant in a personal capacity
Willesden Magistrates’ Court. (Image from the Courts Service website)
At the end of my previous guest post about Brent’s application to stop-up two areas of highway, just to the south of Engineers Way near the Olympic Steps, I said that I would see the Council in Court on Thursday 16 April – and I did! Brent was represented by a barrister from Landmark Chambers, supported by the Council’s top Transport Officer and a Senior Engineer, and by Quintain’s Head of Planning (it was Quintain who had asked Brent to apply for the Section 116 Highways Act 1980 Order). I was represented by – me!
I arrived early for the 2pm hearing, and had an amiable discussion with the Brent team and their barrister, who had sent me, late that morning, a four page “Applicant’s submission” document and a fifteen-page copy of a decided Highways Act court case (R. v Leeds City Council, ex parte Spice) which they would be quoting from in support of the application. I don’t know whether they thought this would intimidate me, but I assured them that I had plenty of experience in dealing with Statute and Case Law from my working life.
Heading from the front page of the “Spice” High Court Judgment document.
The Magistrate hearing the cases listed for Court 4 did not appear until around 2.30pm, but it was not because he was having a long lunch. It turned out that he had also only received the latest documents from Brent Council that morning! When we got to “our” Case 6, around 3pm, he asked me whether, in the circumstances, I would like an adjournment, so that I could consider these extra documents, and a one centimetre thick “Application Statement” (“AS”) which Brent had submitted to the Court on 7 April. I was only passed a copy of this by the barrister at the start of the hearing. I thanked him for the offer, but said that I was happy to proceed, as it was in everyone’s interests for the matter to be resolved without further delay.
Brent Council’s “Application Statement” document.
The barrister presented Brent’s application, setting out that the Council had complied with all of the procedural requirements for giving notice, and stating that the Section 116 Order was needed so that responsibility for maintaining the old areas of unnecessary highway could pass to Quintain, who had since developed the land. She referred to photographs in the AS showing the locations of the highway, including those for the eastern hatched area pictured here:
The “eastern area” photos from Brent’s Application Statement.
The barrister’s presentation went on for around twenty minutes, and then the Magistrate asked several questions. One was about the assurance which Quintain had entered into with Brent, which was claimed to reinforce the Section 106 planning condition which allowed public access to the land which was the subject of the application. He was particularly concerned with the wording in the final sentence of Quintain’s letter of 30 March 2023, a copy of which was at tab 11 in Brent’s AS. That sentence said:
‘Although the land will be stopped up, Quintain can confirm that it will remain open to the public and remain free for people to pass and repass over but for the avoidance of doubt there is no intention by Quintain to re-dedicate the land as highway and public access would be on a permissive basis only.’
Quintain’s 30 March 2023 letter (with personal names deleted for privacy).
The Magistrate felt that ‘on a permissive basis only’ suggested that the public would only have a “licence” to cross the land, not a firm legal right. Quintain’s Head of Planning said that was not what they intended – the company simply wished to ensure that parts of the public space could be closed off for maintenance on the occasional day when this might be necessary. There was a short break while a revised final sentence was drafted, which satisfied the Magistrate’s concerns.
I was then invited to present my case objecting to the application. I asked whether the Magistrate had a copy of the photographs evidence document, which I had sent to the Council in January, and had emailed a copy to the Court Office the previous week. He looked in his online case file and said that he had a copy, which he felt would be very useful. I then set out my arguments, that the application was wrong in law.
Extract from the application Plan, showing the hatched areas.
Although I agreed with the Council that it was sensible to resolve the residual problem of who was responsible for maintaining the hatched areas of land, they did not need a Section 116 Order to do that. The proposed Order dealt with the land as it is now, and it was necessary for the public to continue to have ‘a right to pass and repass, either on foot or dependent on suitability in a vehicle’ over this land. The draft Order sought the Magistrate’s authorisation to stop-up this highway ‘for the purpose of all traffic and all public rights of way [to be] extinguished.’ But he could only sign the Order if the area of highway was unnecessary.
Two ‘key principles’ from Brent’s “Applicant’s Submission” to the Court.
I took the Magistrate through the photos I’d taken in January, one by one, and referring to the “Applicable Test” section of Brent’s submission, asked whether highway, such as Olympic Way East, was ‘unnecessary for the sort of purpose for which Justices would reasonably expect the public to use that particular way’?
One of my evidence photographs, showing a car crossing the hatched area into Olympic Way East.
I also made the point that if the Magistrate did sign the Order which Brent had prepared, it would create two completely contradictory situations for the hatched areas. Under the planning condition and the Quintain letter of assurance the public had the right to cross that land. Under the proposed Order the public’s legal right to cross those small areas of land would be extinguished. Although the public would see no practical change in their use of the land for now, it could create a legal nightmare in future. Public use of the hatched highway areas was necessary, and it was the Section 116 Order which was unnecessary.
The Magistrate asked me whether I was aware of Section 142 of the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984. I admitted that I had not read or considered it. He said that it was possible for a road not to be a “highway”, and from looking at my photos it appeared to him that Olympic Way East was not a highway, but a ‘road to which the public has access’. Similarly, the footway areas, such as that in front of the Olympic Steps, were not highway, but public space to which people had access.
The Magistrate said that he would retire to consider his decision, but would come back and give it verbally when he had done so. We waited in Court 4 for at least half an hour until we rose as he returned at around 4.30pm. In summary, he agreed with Brent that the legal status of highway was not necessary for the two hatched areas, so he would sign a copy of the Plan. However, he commended me for my public spiritedness in standing up for the legal right of the public to cross and recross those areas, and said that he would not sign the Order authorising the stopping-up of those unnecessary areas until its wording had been changed, to remove the reference to extinguishing all public rights of way.
Both sides left the Court satisfied with the outcome, and Council Officers emailed me a revised draft of the Order the following morning, inviting my comments or agreement. I recommended tidying up the wording over ‘highway maintainable at the public expense’, and suggested that to avoid any confusion over the previous and present uses of the hatched areas they should be described as ‘disused’ and ‘now being part of .…’ I’m pleased to say that my suggestions were accepted, and you can see the difference between the original and final versions of the Magistrate’s Order here:
Opening paragraph of the Section 116 Order document.
Closing section of the Section 116 Order document.
If the Notice last December about Brent’s application for a Stopping-up Order had included the final wording, I would not have objected to it. So much time and effort, over the past few months, for myself and Council Officers, could have been avoided. I think this underlines the point I made in my March 2026 guest post, that if Brent had (as it used to) a General Purposes Committee consisting mainly of experienced back-bench councillors, who could take the time to question Officers and get things right, rather than Cabinet members rushing through an agenda at 9.30am ahead of a 10am Cabinet meeting, the Council could avoid making some of its bad decisions.
There have been too many bad decisions made by Brent Council over the past decade or more, some of them wasting millions of pounds. I hope that the elections on 7 May will see a change in the balance of power, and bring in a majority of councillors willing to work together, across party lines where necessary, to improve scrutiny and decision-making. Scrutiny at Brent Council has been ineffective for too long, mainly because too much power has been in the hands of the same Leader.
I have done what I can, on a variety of issues, to try to hold Brent Council to account, including as an honorary member of Martin’s unofficial “Committee” for around a dozen years, but it is time for official and effective scrutiny to pass back to elected councillors, where it belongs. I hope that readers will consider that when they decide who to vote for in May’s local elections.
Philip Grant.
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