I’m a Coronation Street star and will be heartbroken until I die because of Wimbledon’s controversial £200m plans
THELMA RUBY says her life will be “ruined” when her dream view is stolen away.
The 98-year-old actress – who did an 80-minute solo show on stage on Sunday – lives next door to the All England Lawn Tennis Club in Wimbledon.
And her idyllic penthouse flat of three decades on Wimbledon Hill Road enables her to look out every morning while eating breakfast across the tennis complex – as well as Wimbledon Park, its lake and the now-closed 73-acre Wimbledon Park Golf Club.
It is closed because the golf club accepted the tennis club’s £65million offer to terminate their lease early in order for the All England Club to launch a whopping £200m expansion project.
That saw the golfers, including Ant McPartlin and Declan Donnelly, each given £85,000 in compensation.
However, the intense opposition to the development from local residents has triggered a series of significant delays to the building work, which is unlikely to be completed until the 2030s.
And Ruby, who appeared in Coronation Street in 1996 as Phyllis Pearce’s friend Lily Dempsey, is distraught.
She moved in following the death of her husband Peter Frye but fears her moments of watching the parakeets in the park will soon be nothing more than a memory.
World War Two evacuee Ruby told a meeting group objecting to the plans last year: “My whole happiness depends on looking out on my view several times a day.
“I’m not going to live until it finishes. The rest of my life I’m going to be heartbroken, looking at a building site.”
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The avid tennis fan – who has got tickets to the Wimbledon final this weekend – added to SunSport: “I am so upset because my life is going to be ruined.
“I’m an old lady, although I’m still an active actress and in good health so may live a little more which means I’m going to suffer all the more.
“I don’t know how they can sleep at night because it’s such a wicked scheme.
“I can’t say enough about how heartbroken I am.”
The view gives me physical, mental and spiritual health and that’s what they are going to take away from me
Thelma Ruby
Former West End star Ruby continued: “At the moment, looking out of my window at my beautiful view is what keeps me going because I don’t go out so much.
“The view gives me physical, mental and spiritual health and that’s what they are going to take away from me. They are taking my future away from me.
“Merton Council still have to give permission – they are very dependent on the money they get from Wimbledon and I don’t think they will say ‘no’. That’s what keeps me awake at night and makes me grieve.
“I have the best view in the house. I’d always wanted to live overlooking water and I did everything possible to buy it. I’ve lived here with great happiness and pride for 30 years.
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“They had a lady over here to try and persuade me to change my mind about it.
“I looked out the window and she said, ‘Yes those 300 trees are coming down.’ They’ve been there since the 18th century.”
The All England Club are purchasing the land across Church Road, used as a car park and for The Queue during this year’s Championships, to lay down another 38 grass courts as well as an 8,000-seater show court and a 23-acre public park.
The thinking, from the tennis perspective, is to bring Wimbledon qualifying on to the site from the National Tennis Centre in Roehampton and an extra show court bigger than the current 4,000-seater No2 Court – bringing the grass-court major more into line with the other Grand Slams in Melbourne, Paris and New York.
The extra space, too, will enable more tickets to be sold and fans on site.
However, there are nearly 12,000 signatures petitioning against Wimbledon’s plans from local residents – while MP Stephen Hammond has publicly expressed his objections.
Iain Simpson, chairman of the Wimbledon Park Residents Association, told the Mirror: “The size of the development is just totally unacceptable. It’s a ridiculous application.
“If you think of all the obstacles lying in front of them, in terms of development, it’s just a smack in the face for anything that we could possibly rely on in terms of legal obligations. Basically, nobody trusts them anymore.”
The legal to-and-froing and ongoing challenges mean the All England Club may get their application heard by Merton and Wandsworth Councils in September – although it could be pushed back even further to the point that the Mayor of London or even the Secretary of State must step in.
Justin Smith, head of estate development at the All England Tennis Club, admitted the current site is “undersized” and added to the Mirror: “It’s democracy in action and democracy is for all people, including the All England Club.
“I think this is part of the strength of the planning process – it tests things out. We have to prove things, people are testing us and the local authority and we are dealing with those tests as best we can.
“I think that’s where ‘it’s too big’ and ‘a compromise needs to be made’ isn’t very part of that system – you really need to say ‘there shouldn’t be this because of this’. There needs to be a proper reasoning behind those sorts of statements.”
An AELTC spokesperson said: “We will continue to follow the clearly defined and agreed planning process as is required from any applicant.
“Within this beautiful and historic landscape, the AELTC Wimbledon Park Project will unlock some truly significant benefits for the local community and the natural environment alike.
“We look forward to continuing our positive dialogue with council officers, elected representatives and the local community as the planning process progresses.”