News

Croydon Parks Links is one of the seventy-nine schemes in the Connect2 project that is bidding for £50 million from The Big Lottery Fund in "The People's £50 Million Lottery Giveaway". The winner will be decided by public vote. Internet voting begins on the 26th November and telephone voting on the 7th December.

The Parks Links scheme envisages linking various parks in Croydon with safe walking and cycling routes. It is already proposed, when funding becomes available, to extend Addiscombe Railway Park to Blackhorse Lane tram stop but under the Parks Links scheme a path would continue alongside the tram line and so link up with Ashburton Park and South Norwood Country Park. Other proposals in the scheme are perhaps a little more tentative and vary in their viability. For example finding a route from Addiscombe Railway Park to Wandle Park might run into an obstacle in the form of the railway lines north of East Croydon station. On the other hand Park Hill and Lloyd Park could be linked by the existing Fairfield Path for walking with cycle routes using local roads and it would then be a matter of creating safe designated routes into the town centre.

I do like the idea if it can be implemented sensibly and I do think it is worth voting for Connect2.