There was a recent deliberation by the council's development control committee on Stanhope and Schroder's plans for the East Croydon Gateway site. The application was rejected.

It transpires that the committee objected to it for nine reasons; none of them referred to the lack of a 12,500-seat arena.

Just as a reminder: there are two competing development schemes. One is by the owner of the site, Stanhope, and contains a new Warehouse Theatre plus a 4.5-acre park. The other scheme is by Arrowcroft, which does not own any part of this important East Croydon site, but plans to build a big arena.

In his recent deliberations the independent inspector into Croydon's proposed Unitary Development Plan, of which an arena forms a section, reported: "What I have heard in considering this issue leads me to conclude that there is considerable uncertainty over the development of the arena for reasons of financial viability."

Surely this is damning since Councillor Adrian Dennis, vice-chairman of the development control committee, in a published letter has recently agreed that the inspector's judgement on the importance of an arena on this site would be determinative.

We have recently received details of the nine points why the development control committee rejected the Stanhope planning application. It is clear that, if the Arrowcroft arena application (that has already been granted planning permission) were to be re-scrutinised applying the same criteria, it would likely fail for the same reasons and more besides.

If the development control committee and Coun Dennis want to regenerate the centre of Croydon, then for goodness sake get on with it and forget about a big arena scheme that has no proven commercial viability and is becoming unpopular.

Steve Collins Chairman Canning and Clyde Road Residents' Association Croydon