Bulldozers rip up the trees in Somers Town

• THE diggers have landed.

Residents of Coopers Lane, Phoenix Court and Monica Shaw Court are now permanently locked out of the only green space they’ve had and which had been a refuge during the many years of building upheaval they endured during the construction of St Pancras International station and, more recently, the Francis Crick Institute.

Camden Council clearly disregards the wishes of local people and has offered nothing by way of compensation for the chaos and disruption that the building of Brill Tower will bring as well as the loss of the local park.

I am sure there was a time when councils had the welfare of the residents at the heart of their planning. Now it’s just greed and the prospect of that £17million from an offshore company in Jersey was too tempting. Just whose pockets at the Town Hall are being lined?

In the meantime much needed repairs, particularly to Phoenix Court and Monica Shaw Court go unheeded.

In 2016 the council’s ironically entitled “Sustainability and Green space – Supporting Communities” department invited the residents of Phoenix Court to join the Somers Town energy network and get new heaters installed to replace the hideously expensive electric ones.

They backed down on this due to “significant capital cost increases” so the defective heating system remains.

May I suggest that they now dip into that great pool of money and install a decent heating system for these flats and do the necessary other work to bring these homes up to a decent standard.

It won’t bring back our precious green space but would go some way to alleviating the pain of watching the bulldozers rip up the trees.

JULYA McCLORY
Phoenix Court
Purchese Street, NW1