25th July 2001
A LEGAL battle is looming over plans to turn a 78-year-old allotments site in Birmingham into a practice area for golfers.
City council lawyers are planning to issue a compulsory purchase order to try to prevent the Billesley Lane Allotments from becoming a practice ground for Moseley Golf Club.
Simmering
The row has been simmering since 1986 when Moseley Golf Club, which owns the three-and-a-half acre allotment site alongside the seventh fairway, agreed to lease the land to the council.
The lease expires in September, but the club and council have been unable to reach agreement about future use.
Golf club officials lodged a planning application in 1998 to close the allotments and build a practice ground.
The proposal, opposed by Selly Oak MP Lynne Jones and a 600-signature petition, was rejected by the council's development control committee.
The site has been used as allotments since 1923 and was requisitioned by the council during the war under emergency powers in the Wartime Cultivation of Lands (Allotments) Order 1939.
Vivien Griffiths, acting director of leisure and culture at Birmingham City Council, said that all 46 allotment plots were in use.
Long history
She said: 'The site has a long history of high occupation rates and there is a current waiting list of five applicants.'
Dr Sue Dobson, chairman of Moseley Golf Club, said: 'I have been told by our legal advisers that the club should make no comment at this stage. We shall wait to see what the council decide to do.'
© COPYRIGHT 2001 Birmingham Post & Mail Ltd