Councillors have given the green light to a music festival in the borough’s largest park – despite neighbours’ fears over noise and crime.

Elrow Town – a festival that features dance music and performing arts – will be held at Trent Park in Cockfosters on Saturday, August 17.

Residents at a licensing committee on Wednesday (April 17) warned the park and surrounding infrastructure could not cope with large crowds – and a lack of police could lead to problems dealing with anti-social behaviour.

But councillors gave the go-ahead to the event after the applicant, A Man About a Dog (AMAAD), defended the plans and insisted safety concerns had been addressed.

Peter Gibbs, chairman of the friends of Trent Park and the Federation of Enfield Residents, said staging an event with a maximum capacity of 25,000 was taking a “major risk with the public”

He said: “There were safety concerns when the council moved from 10,000 to 15,000-strong events – now we have taken a leap that is not substantiated by any independent assessment we have seen.

“There is no risk assessment we have had access to.

“All these people are coming in through a narrow gateway into the event and back out again at the end of the event.”

Mr Gibbs raised concerns that Cockfosters Station – the main transport hub for people attending the festival – would not be able to deal with an event of this scale.

He said the potential for disruption was “considerable” and the back-up it would lead to on Cockfosters Road would be “enormous”.

Mr Gibbs added that he understood the police presence would be much lower than at previous events, which had 20 to 30 officers monitoring the crowds.

Colin Bull, chairman of Cockfosters Residents Association, added: “Even 15,000 people is problematic.

“We have had lots of anti-social behaviour in the past – people have been drinking for 12 hours.”

But representatives from AMAAD said they had put detailed and extensive plans in place to protect residents and minimise disruption.

Alan Thomas, a solicitor at law firm Thomas and Thomas, pointed out that the experts who had contributed to the council’s safety advisory group report did not think the plans were unsafe.

He said: “We take this extremely seriously. We are putting on more security and toilets than other events.

“There is a lot of money that has gone into this. We can’t afford to get it wrong. We don’t want to be seeing you again and saying ‘none of this was true’.”

Crowd management consultant and former police officer Sean Williams told the committee it was now common practice for events to employ their own security staff to take the burden off police officers.

Mr Williams said: “We are not using marshalls; we are using SIA (Security Industry Authority)-backed security operators.

Enfield Independent:

“They do not have full, warranted officers’ powers, but they can do far more than at previous events. We have a considerable number of them.”

He added that crowds would leave the event in phases to keep transport disruption to a minimum, and that by 10pm 56 per cent of attendees would have already left.

Mr Williams said they would be using extra gates and there would be additional exits in case of emergencies.

Elrow representatives also confirmed there would be a team continually monitoring noise levels and responding to any complaints from residents.

A council officer told the committee said the latest information from the Metropolitan Police was that they were likely to provide one inspector, three sergeants and 18 police constables to oversee the event.

But she added this was not certain at this stage and it would depend what other issues the police had to respond to.

Councillors granted the licence but added an additional condition stating there must be a 1:70 ratio of security staff to customers – higher than the previously recommended amount.