Merton denies its ‘safety first’ approach to once-popular playground is neglect

By Harrison Galliven, Local Democracy Reporter

A much-loved playground that’s fallen into disrepair with equipment reportedly broken for years has been labelled an ’embarrassment for the area’.

Some residents have accused Merton council of neglecting the play area in the 27-acre Wimbledon Park – which is just a stone’s throw from the famous All England Tennis Club.

But the council says its priority is avoiding accidents while it waits for spare parts to make repairs.

According to residents, much of the playground has sat wrapped in orange safety netting or cordoned off by barriers for years, despite frequent complaints from parents who are frustrated their children can’t make proper use of the facility.

Maintenance contractors idverde have installed wrapping “for health and safety purposes.”

Katherine Smart, who lives in nearby Southfields with her young family says its decline has become increasingly more pronounced.

She said: “We actually moved to this area because we loved the park. It’s got worse and worse over the past four years that we’ve lived here, there’s just a lack of maintenance. Now it’s increasingly sad to come here.

“The sandpit used to have lots of equipment with it, but they eventually took all the equipment out because it was deemed unsafe.”

She said failure to get a response from the council after calls for improvements led to set up a Change.org petition earlier this month, which has garnered around 1,000 responses.

Among these were a number of parents who shared Katherine’s concern that the playground was being neglected. Local parent Lucy Newton said: “I live here and the playground is a dangerous disgrace. My children play here all the time and it’s becoming an embarrassment for the area.”

Former resident Fiona Smith said: “This was a major part of my childhood and many others. How dare Merton neglect this.”

Some residents have questioned whether its current dilapidation could be linked with the plans for the Wimbledon tennis expansion set to take place on the former site of the Wimbledon Park Golf Club next door.

Wimbledon’s All England tennis club says it is proposing to enhance some of the community facilities Wimbledon Park – which they say would include a state-of-the-art children’s playground.

This has led some parents to speculate that the delay in playground repairs is related to those promises of investment – that perhaps the council does not want to spend money repairing it when a new playground is in the pipeline.

Ms Smart said: “The general feeling from parents is that Merton is waiting for the conclusion of the Wimbledon tennis expansion plans before they take action because there’s a playground proposed as part of that.

“However, we’re talking ten years down the line for that if it all goes ahead. I imagine the playground will be the last thing on the agenda, meanwhile our kids don’t have anywhere to play. It’s a bit unfair.”

Merton council insists the delays to repairs are solely linked to sourcing parts and they hope to complete them in the next few weeks.

A council spokesman said: “We take the safety of all of our park users very seriously, and as such every play area is checked routinely by our service delivery partners idverde and annually by Royal Society for the Prevention of Accidents.

“During one of these routine inspections, we identified some issues with pieces of equipment in the Wimbledon Park play area. With the state of the equipment deemed unacceptable, we immediately took action to cordon it off and arrange for repairs.

“Unfortunately, some of the replacement parts come from Europe and we’re having to wait a lengthy amount of time for delivery. We hope to have the items repaired and operational as soon as possible, with our current estimate being that this will be in the coming weeks.”

Pictured top: Out of bounds – Katherine Smart’s daughter at the playground (Picture: Katherine Smart)