Destruction of Green Belt Land to Provide 5000 Houses and a New Football Stadium
Nottingham Forest fan Keith Gordon dreams of a new 50,000 seat super–stadium, south of Nottingham. His heart soars as he envisages the club’s modern facilities and future league glories, yet my heart sinks at the thought of the destruction of this ancient and historic landscape that such an out-of-character development would bring. It should be made clear that there would be no stadium without several thousand houses being built and an associated industry, for otherwise no funding would be available to pay for it. This proposal would swallow up hundreds of acres of Green Belt land. On the surface of the earth only a tiny fragment of land (0.0174609%) is designated as such and it is so rare and dangerously finite, it should be treasured and protected.
It is proposed that the stadium and housing estate would be built south of Clifton, which may give the impression of being an anonymous area, but the land in question is actually within the tiny rural parish of Barton-in-Fabis, just 108 dwellings and only 250 inhabitants who fear they will be swallowed up by urban sprawl once the Green Belt is breached. A large part of the area under threat comprises Barton Moor and Clifton Pasture, two vast open areas that played a prominent role in the agricultural heritage of both Barton and Clifton villages. These areas were classed as common land throughout the centuries, and the poorer people of both villages used them for grazing and growing crops in a very efficient, communally managed system, which only ended in the mid 20th century. This land allowed the local cottage folk to remain proud and independent and saved them from becoming a wage-dependent rural working class, which was the fate of the vast majority, as land enclosure meant that wealth was put into the hands of a tiny minority. Clifton Pasture and Barton Moor were never closed and remain ‘open’ to this day, which accounts for the lack of hedgerows in the area. Clifton Pasture, at 365 acres, is said to be the largest area of unenclosed farmland in England, and the University Library holds some of the old account books which detail the hard work local people put into its management throughout the centuries.
The unique and historic landscape is valued not just by local village people, but also by many residents of Clifton, who chose to live there because they are surrounded by Green Belt. Many see it as providing an escape from the hurly-burly of urban life. Some walk the footpaths from Clifton to Gotham and others treasure their open and expansive views across the undulating plain to the wooded hills in the distance from where the ‘wise’ men of Gotham rolled their cheeses to market. The fields are full of farmland birds like skylarks ascending to the heavens, filling the encircling sky with their joyful song. Much of the area is made up of the best and most versatile agricultural land in Britain, which should be protected for the next generation.
Richard Rogers, world-renown architect and Chairman of the Government’s Urban Task Force, wrote in December 2006: “Greenbelts are not there to save the countryside, but to save our cities from a return to the suburban sprawl that would suck out all their vitality and worsen the environmental crises. Suggesting that we need to lose or remodel the greenbelts that surround our cities sends the wrong signal, giving developers hope they will win planning permission for Greenfield development. This will encourage them to give up on difficult urban sites and the fragile urban renaissance of our cities will wither before it has taken root”.
Most modern stadia are built on brownfield land, away from residential areas. Wilson Bowden Developments appears to have convinced Nottingham Forest that building a new stadium in the Green Belt, surrounded by 5,000 new houses, is a sensible way forward. When will they wake up and realise that destroying the Green Belt which provides a green lung for hundreds of people in Clifton is anything but a positive step for a sports club?
Barbara Walker & Angela Plowright
