2020-11-17 Queen Anne’s School Development: Update for DRF Community We submitted a planning application last December to Reading Council in respect of a project to update and improve our sports facilities. There are several different parts to this which if we go ahead would help solve a number of problems that we have:
An artificial sports surface. This will help give an all year round guaranteed training and playing surface for our teams, avoiding the risk of waterlogged or otherwise unplayable pitches. It would occupy the grass pitch nearest to our block of tennis courts, at the east end of the grass field.
Floodlighting. The current proposal has scaled back the original submission, so that the artificial surface and only part of our existing block of tennis courts would be floodlit. In some ways, this is the most important part of all of it for us, as it would allow our girls to practice throughout the winter months after school which they cannot currently do once the clocks have gone back. The issue here will also be the timings of the floodlights and the extent to which they might or might not interfere with neighbours. We have had all the recommended lighting surveys done; these specify the limits within which light must fall (and all the limits mean that all the light would not leave QAS property); and we have asked for a cut off time of 6.30 for the lighting on the tennis courts and 9pm on the artificial pitch.
Flattening the dip in our field. You may know that we have a significant dip in our playing field towards the school end. This is slowly getting deeper. We have engaged a specialist engineering company to design a way of filling in the dip and it remaining flat afterwards. This would give us the ability to have one more grass pitch on the field although the number of fixtures being played would not change as a result. There are then a few areas where I probably need to make things clear for you. In no particular order:
Tennis club. We were talking to Caversham Lawn Tennis Club about them rehoming to our site but all plans are on hold and we have not spoken about any plans for a number of months. My understanding is that they are still to sell their site before making firm plans to move. Much of the concern from local residents was about the amount of traffic this might generate if they had set up home with us.
Car parking and local traffic. As a result of the above, the originally planned car park in the north eastern corner of our site has now been shelved, again helping to allay any fears about extra traffic.
Noise. Following discussions with some residents from Field View, we have agreed to erect an acoustic fence at the corner of the artificial pitch nearest Field View, to give some protection from noise. The artificial pitch will not be hired out on Sundays, although of course our pupils may use it then.