Save Greenwich Park on Facebook

Just wanted to draw your attention to the various Save Greenwich Park bits and pieces on Facebook (as spotted by Jacqueline).  I thought I’d put them in a post, rather than just publish her comment, as she provided a useful link:

There is a Facebook group called Save Greenwich Park.  It is open to anyone to join.

Inside the group, a member called Caroline has created an Event, suggesting a protest each Sunday, (which I think would involve walking along the proposed route)…  So far so good, but it would appear to have been cancelled.  The first one was due to take place on Sunday 17th August at 2pm.  I’ve emailed Caroline stoptheolympicsatgreenwichpark@live.com to find out when the next event will be – and I’ll post up here when I get a reply.

In the meantime, I’d remind you to keep an eye on the “No to Greenwich Olympic Equestrian Events” website, at http://www.nogoe2012.com/

You can see the proposed route for the Olympic event here.

The completely wonderful (if not totally relevant) photo of the squirrel was taken by Flickr user law_keven and is used under a creative commons license.  (Well, it’s peeking out from behind a Greenwich Park tree – it’s close enough!)

Not One Tree

A great deal has been written by many bloggers about the risks posed by holding the 2012 Olympic horse jumping events in Greenwich Park. It seems that some hollow promises have been wrought from the Olympic organisers who appear to promise to “return the park in whatever state it was taken in”.

I think that any campaign against the proposal needs to be very precisely targeted, in order to be effective, and to avoid any accusations of “nimbyism”. The request should be simple:

“Not One Tree”.

If the organising committee can find a way to guarantee that absolutely no trees will be damaged during the Olympics, then the plan should go ahead.

The promise of consultation only increases my fears.  I seem to remember being consulted about the building of more nuclear reactors.

So what can be done?  Is there any kind of audit on exactly how many trees there are in the park, and how old they are?  My suggestions:

Write something along the lines of:

Please give me your absolute assurance that NOT ONE TREE will be damaged if the 2012 Olympic Equestrian Events go ahead on the Greenwich Park site.  If you cannot guarantee this, then I request that you reconsider using an alternative site.

• Write To Them.  Probably not your MEP, but all of the others should be worth a go.
• Use the “contact us” page on the London2012 web site.
• Email Boris mayor@london.gov.uk although the Phantom didn’t seem to have much luck.
• And if none of that works, well, there’s always the spectacular board up on the heath, as spotted by LastBusHome. You could add something slightly more tasteful though.