• IT has been more than half a century since American folk singer Woody Guthrie sang This Land Is Your Land, but its sentiments haven’t yet penetrated the walls of the planning department of Camden Council.

The officers there are happily promoting an invasive Construction Management Plan (CMP) put forward by Essential Living (Swiss Cottage) Ltd.

In this plan the developers are demanding the right to run massive demolition trucks through the parkland adjacent to the stylish 100 Avenue Road office building for three-and-a-half years while they demolish it and replace it with three blocks, including a monstrous 24-storey tower full of private flats.

These trucks will then drive up through the main park pathway and out through the market square and then down Winchester Road.

You could not devise a more ridiculous, and downright dangerous, route if you sat in the deepest basement of the town hall with the lights out! How will this happen when the farmers’ market fills the square for a start?

This land is our land and we pay Camden officers to look after it. So they should be doing everything in their power to protect us from such damaging plans.

There is still a chance for sense. All the vehicular access can be done from the long frontage of the building on Avenue Road. TfL plans to turn this into a bus and bicycles route only, so using one of the six lanes for this “temporary” use is possible.

We hope councillors will reject this ridiculous CMP in its entirety when they meet this evening (Thursday) at 6.30pm in the Crowndale Centre, 218 Eversholt Street. We must stop this appalling plan.

DAVID REED
NW3