Councillors ruled on BHASVIC's floodlit pitch on 2 September. Officers found it would clash with 7 of the theatre's 125 shows, and set 16 conditions.

A floodlit artificial pitch on the BHASVIC playing fields drew 1,362 letters of objection. Brighton & Hove City Council’s planning committee took the decision on Wednesday 2 September, with officers recommending approval subject to 16 conditions written largely to protect the open-air theatre 50 metres away.

The application is BH2025/02901, from Brighton Hove and Sussex Sixth Form College at 205 Dyke Road, Hove. It covers an artificial grass pitch and a multi-use games area on the fields west of Crocodile Walk, with floodlighting, fencing, hard surfacing, access ramps and a storage container.

What is proposed

The scheme takes up about 4,000 square metres, roughly 10 per cent of the overall playing fields.

  • The artificial grass pitch: 61m by 40m, about a third of a full-size football pitch, with a 3G rubber crumb surface, 4.5m fencing and six floodlights on 10m columns.
  • The games area: 30.5m by 18.25m, macadam surface, 2m fencing and 8m floodlights.
  • Between them: an area of hardstanding with space for a shipping container to store equipment.

The sloping ground would be cut and filled to make it level. The pitch is intended for the college and for community hire.

Brighton Open Air Theatre sits in an outdoor amphitheatre in Dyke Road Park, some 50 metres to the north-west of the site. That single fact runs through the entire case.

The objections

The officer report records 1,362 letters of objection, 78 of support and eight neutral comments. Objectors included the theatre itself and the Brighton and Sussex branch of Equity, the performers’ union. A further 12 objections arrived after the report was written, including one from Friends of Dyke Road Park.

The objections cluster around the theatre. Noise from an artificial pitch would disrupt performances, many of which are unamplified. The noise assessment originally submitted did not mention the theatre at all. Floodlighting would affect the performance space and the audience. The pitch could have gone elsewhere on the fields, further away. Sport should not be prioritised over the arts, and the proposal runs against the “agent of change” principle, which puts the burden on the newcomer to deal with its own impact.

Other grounds were more familiar: noise for neighbours, light spill, traffic and parking pressure on streets that objectors say are already full, loss of green space in a designated Nature Improvement Area, concern about rubber crumb and microplastics, and the loss of a cricket wicket.

Supporters, who wrote in far smaller numbers, argued that the college’s current sports facilities are poor, that a third-size pitch will not draw crowds, that there is already a sports field on the site, and that noise is to be expected in the middle of a city.

A ward councillor, Councillor Bagaeen, wrote in support. Three councillors for neighbouring Goldsmid ward, Councillors Barton Ahmad, Miller and Muten, wrote in objection. Their representations were attached to the late list put before the committee on the day.

The consultees split

Two of the council’s own teams objected. Arts and Culture said the proposal was likely to have significant impacts on the theatre’s operation and noted that the theatre appeared in neither the noise impact assessment nor the noise management plan. Environmental Health objected in May over “the potential for repeated LAmax / LAfmax events and other impulsive or intermittent noise sources to interfere with performances”.

The Theatres Trust, the national advisory body, also objected: “It is inevitable there will be disruption of shows by noise coming from the new sports facilities.”

The applicant then submitted an updated noise assessment and cut the proposed hours. On the day of the meeting, the late list recorded that Environmental Health had withdrawn its holding objection, subject to the reduced hours, an updated noise management plan and post-completion noise testing all being secured by condition.

Sport England did not object, subject to a maintenance plan, a community use agreement and the pitch being registered with the Football Association. The ecology consultee asked for a more sustainable infill than the proposed styrene butadiene rubber. Sustainable Transport asked for a parking occupancy survey before concluding.

The number that decided it: 7 clashes out of 125

The heart of the officer’s assessment is not the average noise level. All three noise reports, the applicant’s, the council’s Environmental Health team’s and one commissioned by the theatre itself, agree that average levels would be unlikely to cause significant concern and would meet the 50dB limit set in Sport England guidance, measured over an hour.

The officer report says averages are the wrong measure here, because pitch noise is “sudden and impulsive, with ball impacts, whistles and shouts at an unpredictable frequency and timing”. It also notes the neighbour is an open-air theatre rather than a house, so most published guidance, which is written around residential annoyance, does not really apply.

On peak noise, as heard by someone sitting in the audience, the applicant modelled:

  • a shout on the pitch at 57dB
  • a ball hitting the fence at 59dB
  • a whistle at 67dB

The theatre’s own report produced broadly similar figures. Measured ambient noise at the theatre is between 45 and 50dB, and an unamplified actor’s voice was modelled in the theatre’s report at between 66dB and 40dB depending on how far away you sit. The officer’s conclusion is unambiguous: noise from the pitch “would be readily audible from the BOAT venue and would have the potential to result in significant disruption to BOAT performances”.

What changed the recommendation was the timetable, not the acoustics. The theatre’s season runs from May to September, and it had 125 performances scheduled for 2026. Measured against that schedule, the reduced hours would leave the pitch in use at the same time as a performance in seven cases, and the report says all seven would be morning or early afternoon events, when the existing grass pitch could already be in use without floodlights.

Officers considered and rejected a blanket ban across the five-month season, saying it would erode the benefits for sport at exactly the time of year when unlit grass pitches are most usable. They also accept that the theatre’s schedule changes from year to year, so the overlap will vary.

The hours

Condition 14 sets when the pitch and games area could be used at all. The hours are tighter mid-week than at the start of the week, and they are tighter still at weekends.

Chart of the permitted hours of use for the BHASVIC artificial grass pitch, in term time and outside term time, from Mondays to weekends

In term time: 08:00 to 22:00 on Mondays and Tuesdays, 08:00 to 19:00 Wednesdays to Fridays, and 09:00 to 14:00 on Saturdays, Sundays and bank holidays.

Outside term time: 09:00 to 22:00 on Mondays and Tuesdays, 08:00 to 16:00 Wednesdays to Fridays, and 09:00 to 14:00 on Saturdays, Sundays and bank holidays.

The report says the hours were amended from the original submission specifically to reduce overlap with the theatre’s performance schedule.

The unusual conditions

Several of the 16 conditions exist only because of the theatre next door, and two of them are unusual enough to be worth setting out in full.

The noise management plan required before the pitch can be used must, according to the informative attached on the day, include:

  • identification of the open-air theatre as a sensitive receptor
  • an annual process for the theatre to notify its performances
  • a bar on using the pitch during notified unamplified spoken-word performances where the two would otherwise overlap
  • a ban on whistles during other notified performances happening at the same time as pitch use
  • the same controls applying to college, community and third-party hire
  • briefing of staff, hirers, coaches, referees and users
  • records of bookings, complaints and investigations, and proportionate sanctions for non-compliance

The late list also added a sixteenth condition that did not appear in the published report: a noise validation review, by a qualified acoustic consultant, within the first complete theatre operating season after the pitch opens. It must include attended monitoring at the theatre during a permitted overlap, monitoring from an elevated seat in the audience, a review of booking and complaint records, and identification of the source, level, frequency and timing of individual loud events. If the review shows the controls have not worked, a remedial mitigation strategy has to be submitted and implemented.

Floodlighting is not approved as drawn. Condition 11 requires the luminance levels, hours and predicted light spill, including vertical illuminance at the theatre, to be submitted and approved before installation, then tested by a competent person before first use.

Community use is also conditional. The pitch cannot be used until a community use agreement drawn up with Sport England is approved, covering pricing, hours, access for non-college users and management responsibility.

What it means for you

If you live near Dyke Road Park or Old Shoreham Road, the hours above are the ones to hold the college to, and they are enforceable planning conditions rather than promises. Breaches are reported to the council’s planning enforcement team.

If you book tickets at Brighton Open Air Theatre, the practical protection is the notification process. The theatre has to tell the college its performance dates each year, and the pitch cannot be used during notified unamplified spoken-word shows that would clash. That mechanism only works if it is used, and the validation review in the theatre’s first full season after opening is the point at which it gets tested.

If you want to check the paperwork yourself, our Brighton planning applications page explains how to search the register and how to comment on a scheme.

What we could not confirm

The council’s online planning register at publicaccess.brighton-hove.gov.uk was unreachable when we checked on Friday 5 September, and the minutes of the 2 September meeting had not been published, so we have not been able to see the formal decision notice or the committee’s vote. Everything above comes from the committee report and the late list, which are the council’s own published papers for that meeting. We will update this article once the decision notice appears.

Sources