Gunnersbury Park allowed to keep current noise level for festivals

A Festival Republic event in Gunnersbury Park last year; Photograph Victor Frankowski / Hello Content

Councillors balance commercial interests and those of local residents in decision to keep Gunnersbury Park’s licence essentially the same

Gunnersbury Park has been told it can keep the current noise levels for festivals, but Hounslow Council has introduced a cap on the number of people who attend them.

The Gunnersbury Park Garden Estate residents committee asked the Council to review the Park’s licence to operate events, wanting to reduce both the scale of them and  the permitted noise levels. They went before the Licensing Panel of Hounslow Council on Friday 27 March to make their case.

READ ALSO: Dispute over the future of Gunnersbury Park comes to a head

READ ALSO: Residents await decision on future of festivals at Gunnersbury Park

The park is licenced to run a range of events including live music, films, open air theatre and sports, and to sell alcohol.

The events which the residents group wanted scaled back are the fesivals which attract more than 10,000 people, which impact the surrounding neighbourhood but which the park management say are essential for them to earn enough revenue to run the park.

Waterworks festival 2025; Photograph Jake Davis

The activities offered by the park’s management have not been scaled back. The core permissions for the kind of events they run, the hours, and alcohol sales remain largely unchanged but they have tightened up control, transparency, and accountability of the way in which the events are run.

Most activities will still end around 11.00 pm (10.30 pm on Sundays). Alcohol will still be allowed to be served from 11.00 am –10.30 pm. New Year’s Eve extensions remain unchanged.

The number of people attenting ‘special events’ will now be capped at 29,999 people on site at any one time. The existing licence defines a ‘special event’ as one with more than 10,000 people, with no upper limit specified.

The Park’s management has not yet commented on the new licence conditions, but has told The Chiswick Calendar before that 29,999 is already the maximum number of tickets they sell for special events.

Festival goers at 2025 Waterworks festival; Photograph Angelina Nikolayeva

Rules on noise management tightened up

On the issue of noise, a major bugbear of the residents group, the Panel decided not to reduce the maximum noise level from 75dB. The residents’ association asked for it to be reduced to 65dB.

Speaking on behalf of Gunnersbury Park at the meeting last Friday their solicitor Matthew Phipps of TLT, Solicitors, argued 75dB was “a norm, if we are considering other similar parks” and the demand to change it was “unnecessary”.

They CIC which runs events at the park say they need the music to be as loud as it is to satisfy festival goers, and they are reliant on the cash the festivals bring in.

There are already very detailed conditions in place on sound levels and how they are monitored, but the members of the Licensing Panel have strengthened these, introducing several new conditions:

• Engagement of an independent noise monitoring officer will be mandatory
• Raw noise data must be available to the council
• There will be pre-agreed monitoring locations
• Clear escalation actions if limits exceeded
• Public access to noise plans (on request)
• Events can be blocked entirely if plans are not approved

Gunnersbury Estate 2026 CIC already employs an independent noise monitoring officer for the larger events. Our reporter Tom Apperley went out with Dani Fiumicelli, the accoustic consultant who was overseeing noise monitoring Khruangbin last summer.

READ ALSO: A busy summer of music at Gunnersbury Park and the noise that follows

Waterworks festival 2025; Photograph Jake Philp Davis

Move the stinky toilets

As well as the noise from events at Gunnersbury Park, the residents group complained about the smell of the toilets on site and the amount of litter discarded in their front gardens by passing festival crowdss, including drug paraphernalia.

The new conditions stipulate toilets will as far as reasonably possible not be located in close proximity to residential properties and should be cleaned and serviced regularly to ensure ‘offensive odours are minimised as far as reasonably practicable’.

The Panel has also introduced new conditions requiring the park to provide a drug amnesty bin or bins.

There are already provisions in the existing licence for the park management to formulate a drug policy with the Police which include the refusal of admission or removal from the site of any person found to be in possession illicit drugs, and for the storage and disposal of any drugs, though not specifically the provision of drug amnesty bins.

The Panel reiterated the need for litter picks in the area around Gunnersbury Park as well as inside it. Again, this is something the park management already does to a degree.

The councillors on the Licensing Panel have changed the wording from ‘the immediate surrounding area’ to ‘the streets and other spaces in the surrounding area which can reasonably be considered to have been affected by events taking place under the authority of this licence’.

The Smashing Pumpkins playing in the park last summer; Photograph Mike Massaro / Hello Content

Crowd management

Large crowds cause problem for local residents by blocking the roads, making it hard to them to access their homes, and overwhelming public transport. The new licensing conditions include stronger rules governing crowd management and dispersal, with defined routes from transport hubs; better signage and stewarding; monitoring of crowd behaviour outside the site; and measures to encourage the festival goers to avoid residential streets.

At last Friday’s meeting, the residents’ committee complained that the signage and stewarding arrangements were inconsistent, changing from one event to another, and that crowds flooded through their estate unnecessarily, when they could be kept to specific main routes.

Waterworks festival 2025; Photograph Daisy Denham

Advance notice and better liason with residents

The Licensing Panel has also stipulated the schedule of events must be shared with council six months ahead; it must be published publicly three months ahead; and communicated to residents two months ahead.

The new conditions stipulate there must be a Resident liaison manager for large events who has a dedicated inbox which is monitored daily; there must be named noise/contact officers and a dedicated complaints phone line.

The councillors who make up the panel: Chiswick Riverside councillor Gabriella Giles, Cllr Farhaan Rehman, and Cllr Dan Bowring (Chair) said the new conditions were were intended:

‘to reflect a careful  balance  between  the  needs  of  commercial  operators  to  build  successful businesses, which is a matter the Committee takes very seriously, and the needs of local residents to enjoy an appropriate standard of amenity, particularly in relation to the harms occasioned by nuisance and crime’.

Any party aggrieved with the decision of the Panel has 21 days from the notification of their decision in which to appeal to the local Magistrates’ Court.

SoftPlay at Gunnersbury Park in 2025; Photograph Mike Massaro / Hello Content

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