AN increasingly bitter row over the removal of vintage vehicles from a museum's yard has still not been resolved - nearly six months after a "final" deadline to settle the crisis.
Just under a dozen historic vans, buses and railway carriages are parked on public land next to the industrial-themed Pump House Museum, in Walthamstow's South Access Road.
But the council wants to sell it off to a developer, and the museum's management has agreed with this in return for having a cheap 30-year lease on its building next door.
However, despite a deadline of March for the removal of the vehicles, some of the owners have still not budged. They claim their access to the locked site has been unfairly restricted, meaning they cannot service their carriages and vans to make them fit for moving to other sites and museums.
A war of legal letters between the two sides has now broken out, with threats that the argument could end up in court.
Mick Northfield, 49, owns an historic district line underground train at the site.
He said he was desperate to move the carriage to another museum.
He said: “There is absolutely no reason at all for this inexplicable lock-out situation.
“They are placing obvious and blatant obstructions in my way. All I want to do is tidy up the vehicle and move it away. Does he want this carriage moved away or not?”
Lindsay Collier, project director and founder of the Pump House Museum Trust, denied the claims and said all owners could freely access the site. But he said they could only enter the site on the condition that they give him 48 hours notice and if he is present.
He said: “They are being very awkward. Anyone can come on the site who owns a vehicle at our discretion, provided that they give us prior notice.
“The council wants to sign the agreement [over the land] by October. The council are being very flexible about this but the owners have had plenty of time to make arrangements to move the vehicles somewhere else.”
The council says it plans to market the site to developers in September.
In a statement, the council said: “The legal responsibility for the removal of vehicles, etc, lies with the [museum] trust.
“Any disagreement between the trust and a vehicle owner is a matter for the parties to resolve and not a matter for the council”.
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