Residents and visitors to The Oaks shopping centre in Acton have raised concerns about why paving stones which were fixed earlier this year have become loose again.
The centre, which houses The Gym, Lidl, Poundland and a number of other retailers, is home to hundreds of people some of whom have contacted EALING.NEWS about the return of wobbly paving stones.
In February, EALING.NEWS reported how broken and wobbly paving stones along with broken steps had been increasing and locals were concerned that nothing was being done about it.
According to The Oaks management, which runs the centre for NFU Mutual, the land on which the broken paving stones and steps is owned by housing association L&Q. It said the public had been raising the issue with them and they have been trying to get L&Q to look into it and get it resolved.
L&Q told EALING.NEWS at the time it was working with the “management of the shopping centre to ensure the problem is fixed as quickly as possible”.
Within weeks, the paving stones were fixed but the problem of the wobbly stones has reappeared with locals questioning the quality of the repairs.
One resident living above The Oaks told EALING.NEWS that the issue over the wobbly stones has started to happen again: “What type of repair did they do when it has started to happen again? Over the past few weeks the stones have become unsafe but no one has done anything about it. We are fed up with this.”
A visitor going to The Gym told EALING.NEWS: “Someone could trip up and get a nasty injury. It’s been like this for weeks.”
EALING.NEWS spoke L&Q about the situation residents and visitors to The Oaks are facing and a spokesperson said: “We’re sorry that there had been a further issue with the paving slabs at The Oaks.”
They added: “Our team inspected and made the area safe yesterday (31 August 2023). We’re now looking into a long-term solution to ensure that the paving slabs do not keep coming loose.”
