27/10/2025
🚧 MUGA UPDATE
We have just heard, with one week to go, that Construction on the New MUGA begins on
3rd NOVEMBER for 12 weeks @ location B.
🤷♀️🤷We are extremely disappointed as we have been lobbying the council and our elected representatives for several weeks regarding its location, without success.
⛔️We believe that the new MUGA should not be built so close to the waxcaps (site B), but slightly further away (site C). Friends of Hailey Park informed the council of this as our preferred choice but our requests continue to be ignored. It is not too late!
⛔️Our concerns remain about the new MUGA's location and the impact it could have on drainage and the delicate ecosystem of the surrounding historical area that provides a habitat for the rare waxcap mushrooms: With some careful thought and planning, we can protect the waxcaps and have a new play facility.
⛔️For several weeks we have been asking the council for their ecology report and Management Plan that would prove the ecosystem will not be damaged, but nothing has been forthcoming. We asked our local councillors Dilwar Ali and Jennifer Burke (Cabinet Member for parks) for assistance in obtaining the necessary information and support, but nothing has materialised. We approached our member of the Senedd, Julie Morgan, who happens to be the Welsh Government's waxcap champion, who met with us, but the result was only to promise officers would communicate on our concerns, which they have not done.
⁉️We've asked about the following with no information provided :
⚠️No assurances on protection of Waxcaps in the location that the council has chosen.
No legally required ecology assessment report and no Protection Management Plan. These internationally important species are already being damaged in that area by Taff Trail works. The Council had other options for location of The MUGA but has chosen to further damage the chances of this essential legally protected species.
⚠️No advocacy from our counsellors who set up the bid without involving the Community.
⚠️There was a small consultation for a handful of children on some activities within an existing design decided by council officers and counsellors. The children were not consulted on location or protection of nature regarding this play facility.
⚠️the opportunity for children to learn about, protect and connect with endangered nature in location B when species are in steep decline in our country could be lost in the name of children's play when they could have both the endangered species and the play facilities if located at C.
🚧🚛The park already has 2 large infrastructure projects currently under construction: the chaos of ill-managed, potentially unsafe construction traffic through the streets from the recent start of Taff Trail works around Hailey Park could be set to repeat as we have no response to our requests to consult and inform us and the public about the transport plan for the MUGA construction. It seems no lessons are learned or proactive care taken. A simple transport plan agreed with the council prior to any works and information to the public could avoid this unsafe chaos.
While the Friends of Hailey Park welcome investment and improved facilities, it cannot be to the detriment of existing facilities, nature and wildlife habitats.
Sadly the New MUGA project has excluded any meaningful consultation with the Community at all stages from bid design through to construction with these evident detriments outlined.
📣We call on our elected representatives to act urgently, obtain the ecology reports and set up a meeting this week between FoHP and the relative Cardiff Council departments, to protect our park for future generations.
