Festival toilets have been placed on a new Finsbury Park skate park leaving it “out of action”.

Community group Friends of Finsbury Park (FOFP) has slammed the decision to fence of the skate plaza just months after it reopened.

The project was paid for in part through a fundraiser organised by the group three years ago, which raised £45,000.

Haringey Council also invested £145,000 towards the cost of the redevelopment, which opened in April.

The new skate park features moveable obstacles including kickers, manual pad, kerb and wallie rail.

But the area has not been useable in recent weeks, having been turned over to Wireless festival as its toilet block.

Ahead of its opening, the council said that the new skate plaza was only made possible by the income generated from the park hosting major events.

Haringey Council’s cabinet member for culture and leisure, Cllr Emily Arkell, also said that a different location for the skate park was suggested before work began on redeveloping it.

But, she claimed, the park group "insisted on" it remaining in its current location. 

Cllr Arkell said: “On that basis and before proceeding with the project, we entered into a memorandum of understanding that the skate plaza would be out of use for a couple of weeks each year.

“Within the terms, there does include a review period and we would be more than happy to work with the FOFP to ensure this area doesn’t need to be used if another equivalent space can be identified."

Friends of Finsbury Park trustee Gina Harkell added that not only was the skate park blocked off, the rest of the site was muddy after two consecutive weekends of events.

Mud in Finsbury Park after Wireless FestivalMud in Finsbury Park after Wireless Festival (Image: Gina Harkell)

Gina described the current situation as “crazy”, and urged the council to rethink hosting big events in the park.

She said: “The main problem with all this destruction is that the park is then made useless for the rest of the summer, because you can’t have a picnic in a field of mud.

“We do all also worry about those beautiful plane trees that have containers and hoardings on their roots.”

Gina suggested reducing the capacity of the festival from 50,000 people to 30,000 and hosting it every other year - as happens at Glastonbury - to reduce damage and give the park more time to recover.

She added that if the council fears losing money from holding big events less often, it could double the fee it adds to ticket prices for the use of the space.

Festival Republic, the organisers of Wireless Festival, were also approached for comment about the skate park.