‘Memorial will destroy green legacy’

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Published: 11 June, 2010

The planned Bomber Command memorial will cause great harm to Green Park, says Juliet Lyle 

MANY thanks to those who, years ago, planted trees in our streets and designed our open squares, parks and gardens. 

We inherited these precious legacies for our peaceful enjoyment and recreation. 

Through their careful upkeep and preservation we show that the current caretakers value the inheritance that will pass to future generations. 

The benefits of living in central London and as close as possible to nature cannot be overstated. 

The clean air and green spaces help balance our hectic, polluted urban environment and bring about feelings of relaxation for all ages, well being and wonder. 

Many residents would like to contribute to London’s open spaces, and the Middlesex Hospital site allotments are a good example of local enthusiasm.  

Sadly the project was dropped after a year of negotiations as the new owners could not be located in Iceland. 

The site will now be rubble for many years until it is profitable to build upon. 

We don’t all have the urge to grow things, but those of us who do enjoy the therapeutic feeling of creativity, seeing the comings and goings of wildlife, the development and harvest, and in the process we make our courtyards, balconies and window sills nice for passers by. 

The proposal to build a memorial to Bomber Command on the north west corner of Green Park, is enormously destructive to the park environment.  

June Stubbs, Chairman of the Friends of St James’s Park and The Green Park, together with the Royal Parks’ gardeners and ecologists, had been planning natural changes. 

The holly hedge, along Piccadilly, was to be improved and thickened to encourage sparrows and there were to be new bat boxes on the trees.  

Now 100 metres of hedge and mature trees, including four large silver limes, will be removed and the ground level raised.  

It will become a most unattractive place for wildlife, lacking safe cover and sources of food. 

The monumental structure will also bring a huge human impact on the park by exposing what had been a natural secluded area.

The United Nations has named 2010 the International Year of Biodiversity. Jean Lambert, London’s Green Party MEP, says: “Biodiversity plays a vital role in sustaining life on Earth and we have a responsibility to protect it.”  Is London not listening?  

For our part, we should be planting more trees and hedges, creating gardening opportunities and increasing and improving wildlife habitats. Hundreds of tonnes of Portland Stone should stay in Portland and let’s get on with preserving and improving what we’ve got, not destroying what has been growing happily for hundreds of years.

Is it not ironic that Green Park survived the bombings of London only to be destroyed by a war memorial?  

I hope that The Bomber Command Association start to publicly acknowledge their existing memorials at St Clement Danes in the Strand and in Lincoln Cathedral and that they choose another location and a more humanitarian use of their funds. 

I read with great interest the letter from the Bomber Command veteran to this newspaper last week. 

He says it would be more appropriate to have the new memorial close to that of Fighter Command on the Embankment.  

As they flew as part of a team, there could then be one remembrance ceremony and  Green Park would be preserved. 

Bomber Command should not be treated as an exception and be allowed to build in an area declared a “monument saturation zone”, but more importantly, in an historic naturally landscaped park, that up until May 2010 was considered precious and was protected by all its caretakers.

• Juliet Lyle is a member of the Westminster branch of Green Party