3. White Hart Lane station redevelopment: meeting with Transport for London – 13 July
THST Board member Michael Green and consultant, Bernie Kingsley, who is working with THST on transport issues, met with TfL on Wednesday 13 July to hear proposals for the redevelopment of White Hart Lane station. Finishing touches are being made to formal plans which will be submitted to Haringey Council soon.
The proposals involve the construction of a ticket hall with step-free access closer to the mid-section of the current platform with entrances on Love Lane and Penshurst Road. On Love Lane, this will involve the demolition of garages and the creation of new station forecourt. The most obvious improvement for Spurs fans is that each platform will be served by two new staircases, allowing faster access to and from the platforms as well as helping to ease congestion.
Love Lane and Penshurst Road will be connected by a link through the station and under the platforms constructed by opening up one of the railway arches. This link will be open before matches to allow quicker access from the northbound platform to the High Road but will be closed after the matches to ensure queues for each platform are kept separate.
This is expected to happen during our season away at Wembley with the station ready for our expected return to Tottenham in August 2018.
The station redevelopment is to be funded by the TfL Growth Fund and the GLA Mayor’s Regeneration Fund.
The progress of the plans and TfL’s willingness to share information and discuss it with THST is welcome. THST will continue to liaise with TfL, and will press in particular for the retained staircases to be used on match-days both before and after games to ease congestion, and to offer better access to existing businesses on White Hart Lane.
4. Stadium Community Liaison Group Meeting – 26 July
THST Coard member Martin Buhagiar attended this meeting where those present were given an update on the recent progress of the new stadium build and the on-going work in the North East corner at White Hart Lane.
It was confirmed that, once the season starts, supporters will be able to access the North Stand via the West Stand entrance like last season. Those who sit in the East Stand, coming from White Hart Lane station, will be advised to walk around the supermarket due to the new scaffolding staircase that has been erected for supporters to gain access to the east side of the North Upper.
The Club’s updated West Stand entrance in the new stadium build has been given planning permission.
A new planning application will be submitted shortly to cover a new section called the Northern Terrace regeneration.
Under these plans the listed buildings on the High Road, in front of Lilywhite House and Sainsbury’s, will be refurbished.
Members of the Trust Board are meeting with THFC on Tuesday 2 August to discuss access to the Lane for supporters this coming season and to go over the Northern Terrace plans in more depth. We’ll communicate details as soon as we can after this session.
8. FSF/ Premier League structured engagement meeting – 21 July
Fan reps from all 20 Premier League clubs met Premier League Chief Executive Richard Scudamore and senior members of staff in central London on Thursday 21 July as part of the process of ‘structured engagement’ called for by the Government’s Expert Working Group on football. Structured engagement sounds like the kind of management-speak that sends fingernails scraping down walls, but in simple terms it’s about getting clubs and fans to communicate in a meaningful way.
Items on the agenda were the process of structured engagement, ticket pricing, kick-off times, and safe standing. There was also some brief discussion on the Independent Football Ombudsman’s role, the PL’s commitment to the Living Wage, and PL B teams in the EFL Trophy.
We’re currently waiting for the agreed minutes of this meeting to be signed off, and THST will link to them along with our own commentary. One thing fans may already have picked up on from reports in the press is that Richard Scudamore agreed to consider the request from fans to seek clarification from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport about whether the kind of rail seating recently introduced at Celtic’s ground was classed as seating and so, therefore, would not need the change in the law previously thought to have been required for clubs to introduce safe standing areas. THST has already followed up on this line of inquiry with THFC.
Co-chairs Katrina Law and Martin Cloake are the THST reps at this forum and will split attendance at meetings between them. The first meeting was attended by Martin.
http://www.thstofficial.com/thst-news/thst-news-july-2016