Wimbledon’s development plans to extend the site to the former Wimbledon Park Golf Club course have suffered another setback as opponents of the plan, Save Wimbledon Park (SWP), have been allowed to petition the Court of Appeal.
The grounds of appeal are arguable with a real prospect of success. The case law on the benefits of schemes, feasibility, relevance, material considerations and irrationality deserves review. Lord Justice Holgate
Plans submitted by the All England Lawn Tennis Club (AELTC) to almost triple the size of the grass-court Grand Slam by building 38 tennis courts and an 8,000-seat stadium in the park were approved by the Greater London Authority (GLA) in September 2024, but in a court order Lord Justice Holgate now says the SWP’s arguments merit review by the Court of Appeal.
In July, SWP’s High Court legal action against the GLA over its decision to grant planning permission for the extension was dismissed.
The AELTC says its plans will create a permanent home for the Wimbledon qualifier and deliver 27 hectares of beautiful new parkland, but lawyers for SWP told the court the decision to approve the plans was ‘irrational’ and should be quashed.
They claimed that Wimbledon Park, said to be a Grade II listed heritage site designed in part by Lancelot ‘Capability’ Brown, was covered by trusts and covenants governing how it could be used.
AELTC Artists impression
Separate proceedings are underway in the High Court over whether such a statutory trust exists, and a hearing in that case will take place in January 2026.
SWP said granting an appeal showed that ‘the community and SWP cannot be steamrolled’.
Christopher Coombe, a local lawyer who opposes the plans, said: “SWP has never been anti-tennis. We believe it is high time the AELTC recognized the range of legal and principled problems with its proposals and engaged constructively with SWP and the local community.”
The AELTC say they are ‘confident that the Court of Appeal will ultimately find that the High Court made the right decision in upholding the grant of planning permission by the GLA’, adding that the plans would ‘provide 27 hectares of beautiful new parkland for local people to enjoy, giving the public access to the green space which has been used as a private members’ golf club for over 100 years’.
The plans, the AELTC said, are intended to keep the championships on par with the other three Grand Slams, the Australian, French and US Opens.
A spokesperson for the GLA said: “The Mayor believes that this scheme will deliver a significant number of benefits, including environmental, economic, social and cultural benefits for the local area, the wider capital and the UK economy.
“It will create new courts and public green spaces and strengthen Wimbledon’s reputation as the greatest tennis competition in the world.”
Explaining the reasons for granting the injunction, Lord Justice Holgate wrote: “The grounds of the appeal are arguable with a real prospect of success. The case law on the merits of the scheme, its feasibility, relevance, material considerations and irrationality deserves review.”
A banner reading ‘1963 Tennis Club signed covenant never to develop this’ was on display at the Wimbledon Championships in July, objecting to plans to add an 8,000-seat stadium with a retractable roof and 38 other grass courts to a former golf course across the street.
© Henry Nicholls/AFP via Getty Images
SWP claims the expansion plans will damage the environment and that the Club has failed to properly listen to the community, ignoring a 1993 AELTC restrictive covenant pledging never to develop the land.
“This is a battle between David and Goliath,” SWP said in a statement. “The AELTC is a wealthy, well-connected corporate developer who has worked for decades to take over a substantial portion of this highly protected public park for its own purposes.”
This dispute dates back to 1993, when the AELTC purchased the Wimbledon Park Golf Club land from Merton Council for £5.2 million, and signed the covenant agreeing that it would not use the land ‘other than for leisure or recreational purposes or as open space’.
The next big step came in 2018, when the AELTC bought back the Wimbledon Park Golf Club lease, which expired in 2041, for £65 million, giving each member an £85,000 windfall.
Although Merton Council approved the Club’s expansion plans in October 2023, they were rejected by Wandsworth Council a month later as the Park straddles both areas, leading to the matter being referred to the 25-member elected body, the General London Assembly, which in a 221-page report published in September 2024 found ‘no material considerations deemed to justify refusal of consent’ and recommended that the Deputy Mayor, Jules Pipe, planning would allow. consent to the scheme.
At the time, Pipe said the proposals would deliver “very significant benefits, including to public spaces and recreation, the community, cultural heritage, ecology, biodiversity, the economy, employment and transport” and would “clearly outweigh the harm caused by the proposal and would represent very special circumstances”.
On 3 January 2025, SWP confirmed that it would challenge the consent granted by the GLA at a public hearing on Friday 27 September, with the AELTC named as an interested party, along with Merton and Wandsworth Councils.
The AELTC Wimbledon Park Project includes plans for a new 23 hectare public park converted from a private golf course and inaccessible for the past 100 years, to be maintained annually at Wimbledon’s expense and which will provide a 50% increase in green space for the public.
AELTC Artists impression
The AELTC remains adamant that expansion is the only way to keep pace with the other Grand Slams, all of which host qualifying locally, while it wants fans through the gates during qualifying week, currently held in Roehampton, a few miles away.
Moving qualifying to the Wimbledon venue would see up to 10,000 fans enter the grounds per day, compared to the 2,000 capacity at the Bank of England Club in Roehampton.
The Club also hopes that the new space will enable an average daily attendance of 50,000 people during the Championships themselves, which saw an average of 37,603 visitors per day by 2024.
AELTC chairman Debbie Jevans said in a briefing last month that the need for the transformation had become “increasingly clear” as the other Grand Slams “hosted fully integrated three-week events by welcoming many more spectators and organizing charity and community events during the qualifying week and, crucially, providing the players with a platform that enhanced their sporting excellence.”
Hundreds of campaigners gathered outside the court on Monday to voice their support over objections to the £200 million expansion plans, which they believe will damage the local environment.
“This judgment, if upheld, would set a worrying precedent for the unwanted development of protected green belts and public open spaces around London and across the country,” Coombe, the SWP director, said in a statement issued on Monday.
Protesters also have environmental and social concerns, citing net tree loss and major impacts on biodiversity among the damage development would cause.
AELTC Artists impression
Experts in the field invited to the planning hearing by the AELTC rejected this argument, pointing to plans to plant five times as many trees as would be removed under the plan.
The experts also said the area would perform better ecologically, thanks to projects such as planting wet forests.
Mary-Jane Jeanes, a member of the environmental group Friends of the Earth and a former Liberal Democrat councilor in Merton, pointed out some of the ecological damage the expansion would cause, and the long period over which residents would be affected by the development.
“There’s going to be a decade of disruption while this stuff is built,” she said.
The legal hurdles continue to slow things down as the AELTC says the plan is to build on what has been a private golf club for 100 years, and not on the public land of Wimbledon Park. Although the new development will be off-limits to the public for part of the year, it does not replace any land that is currently public, or has ever been public in modern times.
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