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1/ So this summer, for 3 whole months, @secretcinema is going to take over one of the most important green spaces in Walthamstow, namely Low Hall Sports Ground, to host an immersive cinema experience. Tickets start at £45 each. @lowhallfields
2/ I've heard a little about @secretcinema which was created by @fabienriggall in 2007. You can check out more here https://www.secretcinema.org/history
3/ I'm a big fan of film. Films have kept me going through lockdown. So has @lowhallfields where my partner & I go running several days a week with our dog. Many others play football, cricket, do gymnastics & all sorts on that big playing field. It is a VITAL green SPACE.
4/ According to the plans for @secretcinema - available here https://builtenvironment.walthamforest.gov.uk/planning/ @wfcouncil - we will lose MOST of @lowhallfields for 3 months this summer. It's a fixed fenced space, so it will impact everyone all day and night for those 3 months.
5/ So at the very point when many of us would be using @lowhallfields to relax - be it to run, read, sunbathe, walk & talk, play footie, throw frisbies, play cricket - we won't be able to. As if lockdown hadn't punished us all enough, we're now faced with @secretcinema
6/ Anyone who knows me knows that I love Once Upon a Time in the West. But even if @secretcinema was proposing a Sergio Leone immersive experience, I'd reject it if it was for 3 whole months. Perhaps a fortnight would be good: like a funfair. But 3 months? @fabienriggall
7/ We need our green space @wfcouncil @stellacreasy @secretcinema . Our mental health has been put to the test for the last year. It has been acknowledged again & again that getting outdoors has helped many of us stay sane. Space to run and walk and cry and talk is vital.
8/ @secretcinema sounds like a very fun thing. But NOT when it comes at such a huge cost to us, the local people who use it day in day out, who protect it, and love it, and nurture it. Either a new venue must be found, or it should last for a maximum of two weeks, like a funfair.
9/ What's more, given how many people have lost jobs and income because of Covid, how on earth can @secretcinema @fabienriggall justify such high prices? Who can afford @£45 upwards per ticket? Tell me? It sure as hell ain't a pile of people in E17.
10/ Moreover, you say there will be no cost to the envt & nature @secretcinema @fabienriggall - but have you not considered that by squeezing local people OUT of @lowhallfields we will be PUSHED IN to other spaces, which will pressurise those environments, such as the marshes?
11/ I note @fabienriggall that you are a fan of @LondonFieldLido - I don't blame you! So was I when I lived in Hackney and could swim. But I wonder how you would you if the Lido was reduced to just one small corner of the pool for 3 months? How would you swim your lanes?
12/ As a creative man @fabienriggall I am sure you know the value of day-dreaming, of wandering aimlessly, to work out creative ideas. @lowhallfields provides many of us with this space. If @secretcinema goes ahead, we will lose this for 3 whole months. Don't do it, I beg you.
