Haggerston Park is an open space in

Haggerston Haggerston is a locale in East London, England, centred approximately on Great Cambridge Street (now renamed Queensbridge Road). It is within the London Borough of Hackney and is considered to be a part of London's East End. It is about 3.1 mi ...

, in the

London Borough of Hackney London is the capital and List of urban areas in the United Kingdom, largest city of England and the United Kingdom, with a population of just under 9 million. It stands on the River Thames in south-east England at the head of a estuary dow ...

. It is bounded by Whiston Road (to the north), Hackney Road (south) and St Saviour's Priory, Queensbridge Road (west) and Goldsmith's Row (east). The park was originally created in the 1950s and extended in the 1980s. It was carved out of an area of derelict housing, a tile manufacturer, and the old Shoreditch gasworks, which had been hit by a

V-2 rocket The V-2 (german: Vergeltungswaffe 2, lit=Retaliation Weapon 2), with the technical name ''Aggregat 4'' (A-4), was the world’s first long-range guided ballistic missile. The missile, powered by a liquid-propellant rocket engine, was developed ...

in 1944 and badly damaged. Today, it occupies Haggerston Park contains a small but luxuriant nature reserve and a number of football pitches. The park, one of the few formal landscaped gardens in Hackney, was laid out in 1956. Also dating from the 1950s is a long arcade walk on the north side of the park with a mature wisteria. In the 1980s the park was extended to the south to include a

Hackney City Farm Hackney City Farm is a city farm and independent alternative school in Haggerston in the London Borough of Hackney. It is situated at the junction of Hackney Road and Goldsmith's Row. The farm was established in 1984 as a community and educatio ...

, on the site of a former brewery, a children's playground and playing fields. At first, Hackney Council buildings in Haggerston Park attracted little opposition - most locals approved of a new SureStart building on the West side of the park. The long-term lease handed to Bridge Academy for the Astroturf was highly unpopular, and in 2007 the Council built a temporary school in parkland known as the Audrey Street Depot. A planning application was prepared and submitted, including a Section 106 commitment to return it to parkland a year later. The Park is within a Conservation Area, and part of the park including the Audrey St Depot is listed as a Site of Importance for Nature Conservation (SINC), a designation used by local authorities in the United Kingdom for sites of substantive local natural value. The planning sub-committee approved the application but then the application was withdrawn and the Section 106 was therefore never enforced. For the following 7 years the council claimed it did not have the funds to make good on the return to parkland, and then in February 2016 it announced it was building a much larger Academy school in the same spot. The new City of London Academy is also "temporary" - for five years, and the Mayor has promised the land will be returned to parkland at the end of the period. But the signs are not good. The City of London Academy is breaching Conditions of the planning permission, despite repeated reminders from locals. On 29 July 1992,

Michael Jackson Michael Joseph Jackson (August 29, 1958 – June 25, 2009) was an American singer, songwriter, dancer, and philanthropist. Dubbed the "King of Pop", he is regarded as one of the most significant cultural figures of the 20th century. Over a ...

landed at Haggerston Park in a helicopter with

Mickey Mouse Mickey Mouse is an animated cartoon Character (arts), character co-created in 1928 by Walt Disney and Ub Iwerks. The longtime mascot of The Walt Disney Company, Mickey is an Anthropomorphism, anthropomorphic mouse who typically wears red sho ...

and

Minnie Mouse Minnie Mouse is a cartoon character created by The Walt Disney Company. As the longtime sweetheart of Mickey Mouse, she is an anthropomorphic mouse with white gloves, a bow, polka-dotted dress, white bloomers, and low-heeled shoes occasiona ...

where he visited the children at the nearby then children's hospital

Queen Elizabeth Hospital for Children The Queen Elizabeth Hospital for Children was based in Bethnal Green in the London Borough of Tower Hamlets, London. In 1996, the hospital became part of The Royal Hospitals NHS Trust, later renamed Barts and The London NHS Trust. In 1998, the ...

. The hospital has since been redeveloped into luxury flats, throwing further pressure on the park. Haggerston Park received a

Green Flag award The Green Flag Award is an international accreditation given to publicly accessible parks and open spaces, managed under licence from the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities, a UK Government department, by Keep Britain Tidy, ...

in July 2008.''Hackney Today'' 188 21 July 2008

References

External links

eSnips

Hackney City Farm
{{Green London Parks and open spaces in the London Borough of Hackney Haggerston