Villagers in war over local green hand 2,000-signature petition over to church landowners who fenced it off

Residents of Bayston Hill in Shrewsbury said they were “horrified and devastated” when The Glebelands was fenced off by landowners, Lichfield Diocese.

They expressed fear over the possibility of homes being built on the site and sadness over the loss of access for the first time in 75 years.

Now a campaign group made up of villagers called Friends of The Glebelands have been to the Lichfield Diocese Board of Finance to try and get their message across, and plead for the green to be reopened to the public.

In a letter they said: “We have travelled to Lichfield today from Bayston Hill to deliver this petition in the hope that villagers’s concerns and hopes may finally be heard and acknowledged.

“Bayston Hill is a large village south of Shrewsbury in the Diocese of Lichfield with a population of 5,200 residents. Many of the houses in the village have been built on land that was gifted to the Diocese of Lichfield and subsequently sold to developers, and The Glebelands is the last remaining area of green space at the centre of the village.

Generations of villagers have cherished the use of the Glebelands for a broad range of activities: community events, headquarters for the village’s Scouts and Guides (who only last month were forced to leave their premises at the edge of The Glebelands), sports, exercise, picnics, dog walking, stargazing, and any of the other activities that people routinely use a large green space at the heart of their community for.

“The Glebelands is perfectly positioned at the heart of our busy village, with four access points, one at each corner, allowing residents from all four corners of our village to come together in a safe, tranquil, traffic-free location.

“In November 2024, fences were erected at each entry point to the Glebelands, ending the long-standing enjoyment of the Glebelands by generations of villagers.

 “This has deeply saddened our community. The community feels a profound sense of loss.

“The Friends of the Glebe was formed by a small group of village residents. Our aim is to protect this small area of glebe land at the centre of the village from being used for development and to preserve it as the last green space in the centre of the village for the benefit of the residents of Bayston Hill.

“The Friends of the Glebe started this petition when the fences were erected, and to date over 2,000 people have signed our petition. It has received over 32,000 views, been shared over 1,400 times, and these numbers continue to grow. 

“We hope that this gives a sense of the scale of sadness that villagers feel for the loss of the green heart of their village. The Glebelands has always been a symbol of our village’s unity and shared values.

“Our request is simple, we kindly ask you to remove the fencing to restore the village’s cherished green space.”

A Lichfield Diocese Board of Finance spokesman told the Shropshire Star that the fencing had been put up after two unspecified “events”, and that the board had “been forced” to do so to “protect its interests”.

A joint planning application for homes submitted by the church district and Shingler Homes was submitted in 2023 for The Glebelands, but was swiftly withdrawn after a groundswell of opposition including more than 230 objections.

No application for building on the land is currently live on the Shropshire Council planning portal.

The petition can be viewed at hchange.org/p/save-the-glebelands