The first planning application to extend the use of Brighton’s open spaces is now open for public comment – days after the legal limit for using the site in question was breached.
A high court ruling last year means the use of open spaces for events for more than four weeks – including set up and take down – now needs planning permission.
Brighton and Hove City Council has increasingly hired out its public spaces in recent years, partly to raise money to mitigate the fall in government funding for local services.
To continue doing this, it is applying for permission to extend this period at a number of sites including Victoria Gardens, Preston Park, Hove Lawns, Jubilee Gardens and Hove Park.
The first of these applications, to use St Peter’s Church Ground for up to 60 days a year for the next five years is now on the council’s planning portal.
It says the main use of the site this year will be for Caravanserai, which finishes on Sunday – weeks before the application will be decided.
The application, written by DMH Stallard planning consultants, says: “It is arguable that many of the events held across the city’s parks and spaces are not materially different to the normal day to day use of these spaces and proceed as planned without them being noticed by anyone as out of the ordinary.
“However, for the purpose of this planning application, we have taken a broad approach encapsulating all events that the council grant a land hire agreement for within the application site.
“St Peters Church Ground has been used to host events associated with Brighton Fringe for several years and has previously been used to host Caravanserai as part of the fringe festival in 2023, as well as fringe events between 2018 – 2014 [sic].”
It says Caravanserai, which has a capacity of 1,500 people, will use the site for 51 days, leaving nine days for short notice events to be held there.
Any event using the site would have to agree to play music quietly enough that it’s inaudible at the nearest noise monitor from 11pm.
The organiser has to submit a noise management plan to the council at least 28 days before the event.
The application says: “It is inevitable that some impacts will not be fully mitigated to everyone’s satisfaction as different people have different tolerances to noise even at low levels. However, it is considered that a combination of the Council’s guidelines and operation of the licensing regime will be an effective means to mitigate any harm as far as possible, ensuring that no unacceptable harm will occur.”
It also says the “poor quality modified grassland” which the events are held on has the same biodiversity value as bare earth, and so if it’s lost, there’s no measurable loss in that respect. Meanwhile, measures are taken to protect the trees on site.
It adds: “The events programme generates direct income for the council through fees charged for the hire of parks and open spaces, event licensing, and associated commercial charges.
“The council’s open spaces events programme 2025 report to cabinet (14 November 2024) records that the outdoor events income 28 target for 2024/25 was £611,420.
“A cessation or significant reduction of events would therefore remove this direct income stream, requiring additional savings from other service areas.”
There is a reason why planning permission is required for an event that last more than 28 days, and that is for the public to comment on the event before it happens not afterwards
Derek is absolutely right, and this is why. My house is just 26 feet (8 metres) away from the Caravanserai site, next to St Peter’s Church to the north. It will be out of use as an “open green space” (the City Council’s own term for it) not for 28 days but 51 days this year – from April 16th to June 5th. All of that without the planning permission which the law absolutely requires.
It is an abomination that an elected Council should treat the law in this cavalier way, denying to residents our statutory right to raise objections in advance. On previous experience, after June 5th it will then take the grass several weeks to recover, rendering the site almost unuseable in its prime period, for seven weeks in the spring and then at least as long again in the summer.
Meanwhile the noisy entertainments opposite go on for 25 of the 31 days of May, from the 1st to the 31st – longer than the permitted 28 days in itself. And up to ten hours every day throughout that period. What carries is the bass notes – the repetitive bang-bang-bang of the drumming rising to our bedrooms, often for hours on end. At 5 p.m., I can hear it at my desk at the back of my house right now.
I like to read in bed for an hour from 10 p.m. before going to sleep, but this month it has been impossible because of this noise rising through my bedroom’s double-glazed windows. All day I have to keep all the internal doors of my house shut and then hide most of the time in the kitchen, the only place in the house where generally this is inaudible. And our Council now wants to make this possible, without further permission, for TWO MONTHS of every year. How can they?
The grass in the area is of such poor quality it might as well be bare soil. We request that any impact of events just like the one we’re applying for , essentially in a retroactive manner, isn’t considered, debated and/or investigated regarding any officially noted or recorded data as well as any other records such as public discussions and/or media ( printed news, local, regional or national radio coverage as well as any comparable items on any broadcast entity/ organisation).
Any observed, recorded and or reported datasets that could be interpreted to comment, question or support any points of view as well as any officially or privately commissioned studies that indicate, suggest, imply or highlight a claim that soil, grass quality or the likes may have been impacted, degraded, damaged and/or lowered by said site(s) repeated and extended periods where the installation of multiple temporary structures, heavy and light plant equipments situating, large/mass seating installations or both heavy and light duty temporary roadways/ pathing are mere speculation and conjecture.
Any investigation of any form would impose undue and unjust requirements or conditions upon the applicant and/or its authorised agents/ representatives ( who someone, not sure who, totally accidentally forgot to apply in advance or comply with established, formal, planning procedures).
Said someone, probably, maybe, so I heard from Bob down the pub the other day but if they did say it no one’s got a clue who they were.
It was council’s own outdoor event management team.
You can view and object planning application BH2026/01114
It’s Brighton Council. So dont ask sensible questions as they wont apply. Ask what about all the empty venues across the city that could host such an event or the derelict buildings and land that could be used? Will the Council be spending thousands on making the area look nice just weeks before it is trashed? Will any money made from this event be reinvested in another more affluent part of the city on padel courts or an outdoor gym for the residents in Hove or Dyke Road? Will anyone ever declare how much the Council gets for these sorts of events? Why with such limited space in the city centre for residents to use does it get taken away regularly? Where do the Councillors who make the decisions live and how close are they to pubic spaces that host events? Will there be traffic chaos in the surrounding area around the same time the council will of course plan to dig up the roads at the same time? How long will this space be used before the council claim it as “tradition” and “of historical significance” and therefore they don’t have to consult any more? Will we get a photo of the leader of the Counicl standing outside of the venue or the Deputy leader in his unbuttoned shirt looking trendy telling us it’s really important for the city alongside a photo of a green councillor with a broken tree or the conservatives mentioning something irrelevant about the titanic? Love those photos!!
This increasing monetisation of public spaces is unacceptable and should be stopped. Public spaces are for the public. It’s ridiculous to say there is no loss of amenity. Preston park for example gets invaded by Pride each year and they cordon off most of the park at the very time children are on holiday, quite apart from adult residents. Other events also cordon it off, but Pride is the worst culprit. They then push to extend the time to recoup the cost of excluding everyone. And they use private security to enforce it with shocking behaviour. These spaces were not as far as I know paid for by the council, they are not their assets. If there are running costs, so to are there in streets etc. why should the council have the right to adopt our spaces to make money? The St Peter’s grounds may be slightly different as they probably own the land, but the parks are for the benefit of the public.
I suppose councils will try and bring in additional income where they can but it is a bit grating when it is at the expense of public space. There’s always a push on for healthier lifestyles but then they block off recreational spaces.
Although I enjoy having caravanserai there I don’t agree with the over commercialisation of these spaces. The prices creep up and then they start charging for access so it becomes an exclusive club only for people with enough money to afford it. Pride at Preston Park is absolutely appalling now. It used to be a great community event open to all and if you couldn’t afford the bar prices you could bring your own. The spiegal area used to be the same many years ago, either buy drinks at the bar or bring your own but they all steadily get locked down, the corporate greed kicks in and your forced to pay extortionate prices if you want to go there. At that point the public space is no longer for the public
As much as I dislike the over commercialisation of public spaces, I greatly dislike residents who live in an already busy, noisy Central location and then complain about the noise! These things were already here when you chose to move there. Who moves next to a busy pub or public space that regularly hosts events and then complains it’s noisy!
These noisy events were NOT here when I moved in in 1997. They have only been in the last few years. Until about 2014, the site just north of St Peter’s Church was surrounded by a light metal fence, although owned by the City Council. I don’t know why that was, but you couldn’t get into it. Then one day, unannounced, that fence had gone and we could use this space at last in the same way as Pavilion Gardens, for example – for some peace and quiet on a summer’s day. But now the Council is denying us that possibility again.
It is incredibly narrow-minded to assume residents don’t have a right to advocate for reasonable boundaries just because they chose to live in a vibrant, central area. Cities are living communities where families and working people reside, not consequence-free playgrounds for commercial interests to completely disregard local quality of life.
The awful and ironic thing about events such as pride which used to be free and open for all is that they now charge extortionate amounts for entry and drinks and a large majority of it is spent on heavy security and erecting a huge wall to keep people out! Can’t we just ditch all that and go back to having our free community event again that was far better and far more inclusive?
I agree with the spirit of that, but I think Martyn’s Law makes that fairly impossible on a practical level needing to comply, quite rightly in my opinion, with ensuring the safety of such events. In the meanwhile, community groups tend to host a variety of smaller, but free events!
Ignoring the High Court now? Which Council Officer heads should roll and when will they? We also need a thorough investigation as to where the events money goes. Not into the parks, public spaces and public toilets it relies on, for certain, closing public spaces off to residents and causing noise nuisance.
I think it is an ideal ideal spot for a travellers encampment. Near the shops and amenities and the odd bit of asphalt for the VG3 project and potholes!