Brighton’s Dorothy Stringer school resubmits plans for floodlit sports pitch

A Brighton school has resubmitted plans for a floodlit artificial sports pitch on its playing field – months after a similar proposal was rejected to save two protected elms.

Dorothy Stringer believes the modern facility would be beneficial to the whole community and ensure dozens of clubs and organisations can have access to a sports area regardless of the weather

But plans to build a large facility at the school in Loder Road, Brighton, were rejected by Brighton and Hove councillors in December after hundreds of people objected.

Keen to appease critics, new plans for a smaller pitch have been submitted – and this time no elms are at risk.

A school spokesman said today (Wednesday March 19): “After a winter of almost no outdoor playing space due to the flooded pitches we are all the more keen to be successful in our application for the revised artificial turf pitch.

“We are fortunate that the funding parameters have changed and we are now able to apply for a smaller pitch.

“We have listened carefully to the objections raised at the previous planning application and feel we have taken into account the considerations and have added in acoustic fencing.

“Although the footprint of the pitch is much smaller than the original application, we will not be significantly reducing our proposals for landscaping and improving the natural environment – tree planting will be an essential constituent of the project with an increased number of feature trees, dominated by English, Wych and Wheatley Elms.

“We will not be removing any elm trees and a small quantity of semi-mature trees will be re-located.”

When the former plans were presented, council officials claimed the “significant adverse impact of the loss of these trees is not outweighed by the benefits of the scheme”.

They added there were further concerns around the impact on neighbouring properties as well as noise and light disturbance.

The council’s planning committee accepted the recommendation, voting 10-2 to reject the plans.

The new proposal is for a 88m x 56m pitch – down from a full size football pitch of 106m x 70m.

The application claims the pitch would operate until 9pm on weekdays and from 9am until 6pm on weekends and Bank Holidays.

A school spokesman said: “As before our aim is to work with all the schools on campus, other local schools and of course the community clubs.

“We are very excited about this proposed project and intend to continue to make sure that it places biodiversity enhancement at its heart.

“We want to create a living landscape upon which the whole community can make a very real and positive contribution to local nature conservation.”

David Macdonald, of Save our School Trees campaign, said: “We are pleased that Dorothy Stringer school are no longer going to cut down the two precious elms to develop their floodlit pitch proposal.

“The new proposal for a smaller under 16s pitch is more sympathetic to the area.

“However developing the pitch will still involve cutting down established native woodland trees which were planted as part of the landscape scheme which enabled the school to carry out their last major development.

“The floodlights and long hours will be disruptive to local wildlife and residents.

“We question the support that the school has for this pitch: When they put forward the last application they directly canvassed the parents of
over 2400 students at Dorothy Stringer and Balfour schools and only
gained support from about 10% of parents.

“This is in comparison to a petition signed by over 500 concerned residents who did not want the pitch.

“We need to see more concessions in terms of opening hours, and loss of natural woodland habitat before we can withdraw our objections to the current scheme.”

Anyone who wants to make comments can visit the Save Our School Trees Facebook page or email saveourschooltrees@gmail.com.