WE strongly support the campaign to save People's Park, in Sudbury, as, along with many others, we believe that open spaces are even more essential than ever. The density of dwellings in Sudbury is continuously increasing and with the loss of open spaces for public amenities People's Park now stands as one of the last, other than Friars Meadow and the common lands. Such events as the fairs and the circus have now no longer any site in the town.
We all realised that if a compromise had to be made for improved health services in the town then it would have to have been sacrificed, but it has been clear that this site has been realised as an asset. The promises cannot be believed as the remain
der of the debt is so significant and continuously rising that when and if it is paid off situations will have changed and Sudbury will be forgotten at a time when West Suffolk Hospital and its status in the future is also possibly subject to change.
The whole question regarding the hospital and any future services clouds the issue which is so important also for the future of the town. Once this land has been developed it is gone forever and Sudbury is now joined to Great Cornard, Chilton and in the future Acton, Great Waldingfield and Long Melford. Common recreational spaces will become more precious and important than ever.
Unfortunately, the memory of cattle grazing on People’s Park seems too far in the past. Even though a large proportion of the land was sold off to finance highway and drainage alterations and the purchase cost of the land to housing, the remainder is still so significant and important to us all.
Why should we have to campaign to save what is rightly ours for everyone to use and enjoy when its reason for sale has so dramatically changed and the only reason for changing its use is to alleviate problems created by others?
JERRY and SAM MAYNARD
Park Road
Sudbury
The full article contains 342 words and appears in Suffolk Free Press newspaper.
