Lynne Featherstone

I had arranged a meeting with London Underground (LU) and Tubelines to look at a possible compromise over the now famous – but very problematic fence – erected by LU to stop noise descending into Priory Gardens, by Highgate Tube Station. Unfortunately Priory Gardens’ meat is Archway Road’s poison and those residents are very concerned over the reflection of noise, loss of view and so on.

Anyway – a lot of work has gone on to find a compromise position that will give everyone something of what they want – but obviously not their first choice as their first choice is bad for each other. Archway Road ideally want no fence which would be dreadful for Priory Gardens and Priory Gardens ideally want as much fence as possible – which would be dreadful for Archway Road.

The meeting was intended to be an examination of the technical merits of the proposal – to see if it was worth taking further. But when I arrived at LU I found that LU appeared to have invited some of the key objectors without any reference to me. I was very angry as this meant a technical discussion instead turned into the old rows and for the most part sabotaged the original purpose of that meeting.

However two good things came out of it: firstly the planting of foliage was agreed and can go ahead and secondly LU will have a look at the scheme that was presented.

The compromise position is basically cutting down the height of the solid fence to 1 metre, cladding it in sound-absorbent material and filling in the remaining required height with mesh. I hope a compromise can be reached.