The campaign opposing the construction of a new sports performance centre at Caird Park have received political backing from the Scottish Green Party.
The Care for Caird campaign is an action group hoping to prevent Dundee City Council from building the Regional Performance Centre for Sport in Caird Park.
Dundee City Council announced in June plans to build the £21 million complex, which might also be used as a training facility for Dundee Football Club.
Maggie Chapman, co-convener of the Scottish Green Party, said she would do all she could in support of the campaign, as would the party.
She said: “This campaign is a very important issue for the people who live close to the proposed development site and also the wider city.
“Caird Park is one of the few big expanses of green space available in Dundee, and there are so many other areas which could be developed.
“I am not saying we do not need sports facilities, but what we do need are community facilities, not facilities that are going to block out vast parts of the city.
“We should also not have facilities that detract from existing green space and existing wildlife areas.
“We should be promoting public space which is free to access and easy to access, in Dundee and across Scotland.
“This campaign is quite symbolic, we have seen this sort of thing happen elsewhere in Scotland.
“Facilities like the one proposed for Caird Park are not a bad idea. The problem is where they are being sited.
“Caird Park has so much potential to offer genuinely free public space and facilities for people and building a sport complex there will restrict access to it.
“There are brown-field sites across Dundee which should be used to build these kind of facilities.”
Amy Paterson, 24, set up the community group because she is concerned about the implications to wildlife.
She is also concerned about the lack of contact she has been able to make with councillors in the city, and feels she is being ignored.
Craig Forsyth, 22, joined the action group after initially being excited about the prospect of a new sporting facility in the city.
“As a Dundee FC fan, when I first heard about the new complex and what it offered, I was delighted about it,” he said.
“However, once the possible implications to wildlife and the consequnces of building the complex were highlighted, I changed my mind.
An ecology survey has been carried out at the park, as part of the council’s planning application for the facility.
The report said the Trottick Mill Ponds- a nearby nature reserve- are unlikely to be affected by the development, due to the busy Claverhouse Road which separates Caird Park from them.
It also takes in to consideration the suitable bird nesting site within the proposed site, but found no evidence of protected bird species roosting in the area.
The main grassland habitat at the proposed site is described in the report as “species-poor amenity grassland” and of “very limited botanical interest”.
A spokesperson for Dundee City Council said: “The council’s development management committee will meet to decide on the application in due course.”
