Lessons from Burnt Oak's Play Street and Market Event

Temporarily closing the road to motor traffic frees up space for activity and community use - whether that be a street party, market or play street. An event or series of events like this can have many benefits to the local community:

/ To activate the street and create a safe environment for the local community to get together
/ To reclaim space for pedestrians
/ To highlight the opportunities when vehicles are removed
/ To promote active travel such as walking, cycling and wheeling
/ To reduce pollution and promote a healthy active lifestyle
/ To enhance a sense of community amongst local residents

What street?
It is important to choose the correct street to close. Consider how the street is connected to local amenities and how this could be used to promote the event. Teaming up with a local primary school can be beneficial as it can highlight the opportunities of a play street and if timed correctly, you are guaranteed good footfall.

Timing
Choosing the right date and time of the event is also integral to its success. Give yourself the best chance of good weather hosting the event between May and September. Choose the day of the week to best attract the target audience - weekends during school term times are the best for a market or street party. However, a play street would work best after school closes on a weekday.

Music
Music helps to activate the event and make it feel more lively. If possible, live music is always preferable and gives the opportunity to promote a local artist. DJ on decks is another great option - even better if the DJ can facilitate people to have a go at DJing themselves.

Promotion
It is important to promote the event with plenty of lead-in time, say at least 3 weeks. The emphasis should be on encouraging local engagement, therefore flyering and promotion on local social media groups should be prioritised.

Markets
A market offers a great opportunity for groups to host activities or promote their work. Build connections with local groups, invite them to the event or to host a market stall to promote their organisation or host an activity. Consider how the organisations invited contribute to the event's ethos or intention. Be aware that to exchange money, be it through sales or donation, a street trading licence is required.

Remember these important points:
/ All participatory organisations will require public liability insurance
/ A risk register must be completed
/ The event should have a lost persons point and fire evacuation points
/ If you are planning to take photos or video let people know. Place ‘This event is being recorded’ signs up so it’s clear and people can let you know if they don’t wish to appear in photographs or film.
/ A timetable of the day’s events should be shared amongst organisers
/ Depending on the scale, you may need a Temporary Events Notice (TEN)
/ In order to close the road, you may need a Temporary Traffic Regulation Order (TTRO). Give yourself plenty of lead-in time to discuss and obtain this with the local authority (12 weeks).

Burnt Oak Community Fun Day
A Case Study
A road closure event can be used to promote public realm improvements. In the case of Burnt Oak, we co-organised an event with the London Borough of Barnet to pilot the transformation of the town centre and give the local community the opportunity to experience a different vision for spaces, currently dominated by vehicles. To make changes more tangible, we hosted a Community Fun Day, whereby play, greening, walking and cycling were celebrated and brought together to inhabit Barnfield Road, a key link between the main shopping street and a local primary school and park.

The event took place on 27th September 2023 between 2pm and 6pm, with the road closed between 9am and 8pm to allow time for both setup and dismantling of stalls and play features. The intention of the event was to bring together the local community and highlight the opportunities of a school street connected to Barnfield Primary School.

For the event, we made use of features from McCLOY + MUCHEMWA’s Urban Playground, a project for the London Festival of Architecture, which were in temporary storage before being permanently re-homed. The play features were integral to the success of the event as a wave of primary school children poured onto the street as school finished. Borrowing the play features before they went on to their final home was a more sustainable option than commissioning new features and more fitting for the one-day event.

A series of craft and sustainability stalls occupied the market prioritising activities for children. The market stalls included Dr Bike bicycle repairs and local organisations such as the Romanian Culture and Charity Together. This gave a great opportunity for the community to connect with local groups. Our team from Erect Architecture presented the Burnt Oak Town Centre public realm project to people from a big yellow gazebo.

Live entertainment helped to activate the event and provided a great backdrop, drawing people in from the High Street towards the action. A magician was always surrounded by a group of people, be it children, adults or the team from TBF traffic who managed the road closure.

A raffle of the plant arrangements used to ‘green the street’ from local florist Aspens closed the day's proceedings. The event was a milestone for the project, highlighting the opportunities of reclaiming public space for pedestrians and broadening engagement to a wider, diverse audience, many of whom came upon the activities whilst using the town centre for everyday errands and engaged on the scheme for the first time.

Elliott Rawlinson
Part II Architectural Assistant