Once in Shoreditch Park there was a place where you could play football. Where you didn’t have to book the pitch or pay for the floodlights. But now there is a big ugly rock standing where we used to play. A rock that does nothing. You can’t even climb it as they have taken away the hand grips.
So, someone has decided to put a bit of contemporary art in the park. Why could they not spend the money on improving the pitch that was already there instead? It wasn’t great but it was the only place to play football that was free in the park. The Britannia playing fields nearby must be booked and if you go there at night you have to pay for the floodlights. You can usually play on them, but if someone has booked the pitch you have to leave.
Could Hackney not have followed Islington’s lead? The dusty fenced pitch in Rosemary Park was improved and now has astro turf, goals and fences preventing you from losing the ball.
Michael Pyner, the chief executive of the Shoreditch Trust, the people in charge of the regeneration of the park, said. ‘If you are going to put in art then please put in art that can be used. At first the rock did have hand-holds but these have since been removed leaving the rock only a viewing pleasure or eyesore. Pyner also claims there hadn’t been a child playing on those pitches for the last 12 months. This writer believes this is untrue. People have used them less in recent times as the council took the fence away so you lost your ball if you tried to play.
Do we really want to pay for an expensive rock rather than pay much less to renovate the football pitch which in my eyes would have been more popular for the borough’s young people. The young people that are so often accused of getting into gangs and crime because they have nothing to do. Well, they won’t be occupied by looking at that rock that is for sure.
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This opinion piece was produced by Edgar Jefferson-Brown aged 15 