The arguments for its closure have been a scam from day one and merely an attempt to stop people from the housing estate from using a public park (Metropolitan Open Land).

In the meantime, parents swapped primary schools because of the great barrier and some bought cars just to get their children to school. The journey to Green Lane primary for the housing association residents is now a five-minute walk through parkland. Hurray.

As for the curfew for the housing association residents, if it still exists, I don’t think it has any force in law. If Thames Valley Housing/St James’s Homes (developers) were to take the residents to court then they’d lose because of social discrimination. A judge would rule the curfew unlawful – or should.

The private residents have tennis courts on the Hamptons. Why? There are already tennis courts close by. I spoke to one boy on the housing estate: he said he wasn’t allowed to play tennis with a boy on the private side because he was from the housing estate. I have never seen the tennis courts in use and believe the gym on the private side closed due to the cost of upkeep.

Yes, I’m sure people on the estate misbehave but people do everywhere. The people I have sympathy with are those who bought houses in the area before the Hamptons. Living close to a disused sewage works is arguably better: no traffic.

I have no sympathy for those who bought houses on the Hamptons (private side) because they should have been full in the knowledge that they were funding a public park and living close to a relatively large housing estate.

Anyway, there has been progress. Parents no longer have to use a grotty, previously disused, unlit back alley (unsuitable for pushchairs) to get their children to school. At one point the developers installed a padlocked, metal gate down this alley (a public footpath) in order to prevent access to the park. They said this was in collaboration with the police. The police cannot close a public right of way. Even in the event of a crime scene, they’d have to make alternative provision.

Sutton council are just as bad. They recently instructed St James’s Homes to do some repair work at another boundary point. They gave them a start date (May 2oth)but not a completion date. So far a small hole has been dug! The work will never get done.

I believe a similar development has been built in Kew – fancy facilities but only for the private residents.

I have mixed feelings towards the Hamptons. I haven’t seen kids misbehaving but hear of mindless vandalism. But I don’t have much sympathy for those on the private side: they knew they would be living close to a council estate. I feel more sympathy towards those who have been landed with an estate close by.

The park remains gated off, so only the people on the private side can use the public park. Those on the housing association side have a 30 minute walk to use a park on their doorstep.

St James Homes argue that the wall was erected because of construction vehicles/work. No work takes place at weekends, though the park remains shut off. The construction area is already fenced off.

A footpath nearby was closed – apparently in collaboration with the police – due to anti-social behaviour but was re-opened when the children at the housing association end could no longer walk to their primary school because of the wall. So it’s OK to use the path when it suits St James Homes, of course.

Anyway, I believe the MP has taken up the matter of children being denied access to the park.

The wall is a further example of social engineering on the Hamptons. Yes, there are probably troublemakers on the estate but I don’t see them.

Since you wrote your article not much has changed at the Hamptons, the children from the Thames Valley Housing Association have continued to vandalise the Hamptons residents homes and cars, the only difference being, they are now starting as young as 10.

They are terrifying some of the residents, by throwing bricks through there windows, walking around in gangs (ranging from ages 10 to 15), on the complex carrying planks of woods, bricks, chains, etc.

I sometimes hear yelling at night from the Hamptons and see the bottles of booze discarded along Boscombe Road – the residential road leading to the Hamptons. Living in a private development where many don’t drive, I did fear an influx of abandoned cars.

But the culprits of antisocial behaviour and parking cars on other’s land/ using this cul de sac as a weekend dumping ground for industrial vehicles are the older people in their tatty, three/four-bed 1930s semis along Boscombe Road.

They are not the most classy of people – many would have bought when the houses were very affordable. Some flogged their back gardens in the 80s, yet feel they have the right to claim them back years later. They lost their rear access in the 80s when they sold their land. But, no, they want it back. Up goes a gate, private parking is abused and cement mixers, etc dumped. Yes, on someone else’s freehold property.

These are the people driving around in banged-out Astras, Cortinas, chucking fag ends over their fences, etc. They should stop looking down their noses at people with smaller houses/council houses. And is their behaviour – trespassing, for example – any better than the Hamptons residents’ shouting and chucking litter about?