THE Ahmadiyya Muslim Association (AMA) has withdrawn plans to permanently divert a footpath at Oaklands Farm. Footpath 27 runs through the farm and over the site of AMA's annual Jalsa Salana convention site in East Worldham. The diversion would add an extra 500 metres to the route. A meeting to discuss next year's event, at East Worldham Village Hall last Thursday, was attended by the AMA and a panel of East Hampshire District Council experts. Due to the unpopularity of the footpath suggestion the association said it would halt negotiations. The meeting moved on to a discussion on transport, planning and noise. This was introduced by district council officer, Tom Horwood. Mr Horwood said that the AMA would now take the disastrous weather conditions of 2007 as their benchmark and not see it as unlucky. He said that the AMA were working on a new transport plan which would be submitted formally in January. AMA vice-president and Jalsa Salana co-ordinator, Akram Ahmedi, asked for the community's 'forgiveness' for the 2007 traffic fiasco. He said: "We are very sorry and we don't want a repeat. We take it very seriously and have therefore been making a transport policy for next year and the years to come." Mr Ahmedi also said that there would be no more planning developments on the site that would require planning permission, except those that related to agriculture. He mentioned that they had had problems with some of their contractors and the noisy work conducted out of normal builders hours, and that they had warned the contractors that if there was any repeat that they would be forcibly removed from the site. Following the meeting, Mr Ahmedi said: "I think the meeting went well, and was very constructive. We believed that the community wanted us to apply for a permanent change to the footpath, and we have learnt that is not the case. "We want to co-operate with the community, and with that regards we will continue to apply for temporary closure in the future. "In terms of traffic congestion, we now have a robust traffic plan and we are confident we can make it work." The traffic plan includes limiting the vehicles on the site to between 2,500 and 3,000, using the Tilford site for excess parking and using specially organised buses to travel between sites. This summer some convention goers had to be parked at Tilford and bussed to East Worldham, although this was done unofficially. The association is in contact with South West Trains and is organising parking at Wimbledon and Morden where most of its members live.
