Take Me Home – country roads lead to music festival in Tooting

A ‘controversial’ two-day country music festival will be held at Tooting Common this summer.

Enable Leisure and Culture has won a licence to hold Country in the Common, on Tooting Common, over one weekend later this year which would feature ‘country, roots, folk, blues and associated Americana music genres’.

Wandsworth council approved contractor Enable’s plans to hold the two-day event from 12pm-10.30pm on the Saturday and 12pm-10pm on the Sunday in Lido Field, a section of the park, with alcohol sales ending 30 minutes before closing.

The family-friendly event will have capacity for up to 6,000 attendees each day, with the exact dates to be confirmed soon.

The festival will take place as part of Wandsworth’s year as London Borough of Culture, which kicked off in April. The year-long programme will see a variety of arts and music events held across the borough, which the council previously said would include ‘world-class performances and grassroots creativity’.

The council’s licensing committee met on April 9 to discuss plans for Country on the Common, which had received 15 written objections and two letters of support from the public ahead of the hearing.

Tim Whitaker, representing The Streatham Society, raised concerns local residents would be unreasonably disturbed by noise from the festival, which would attract crowds from outside of London, and antisocial behaviour.

Mr Whitaker said conditions proposed to ease the impact on locals did not appear robust enough, including there not being enough stewards to ‘protect the neighbourhood’.

“My concern is that there are too many risks here and there isn’t enough mitigation to help prevent the damage,” Mr Whitaker added.

Peter Ramell, chair of Friends of Tooting Common, said the plans had ’caused a considerable amount of controversy locally’. He said the group supported the festival on balance, but warned there needed to be ‘very strong and appropriate safeguards to protect the common itself and the interests of other users’.

Daniel Wales, senior events maanager at Enable, told the hearing the company was experienced in staging major events – including in Battersea Park. He said Lido Field would be able to support the festival as it previously hosted the 2012 Olympic Torch Relay, which was attended by around 10,000 people.

Mr Wales said: “I believe that we have addressed all the concerns raised by authorities and local residents. The necessary conditions regarding noise management, security and public safety have all been agreed upon with the statutory bodies and we are committed to running a really smooth, well-managed event.”

The council’s licensing committee granted the licence after ruling the event was ‘suitable for approval’.

Conditions on the licence mean the event will be guided by noise, safety and crowd management plans to minimise disturbance to neighbours, while attendees will not be able to take booze outside of the area. The field will also need to be fully cleaned within three days of the festival ending.

Day and weekend tickets will be available to purchase for the festival in due course.

Pictured top: Entrance to Tooting Commons (Picture: Google Street View)