Latest news with #Anning
Yahoo
30-05-2025
- Business
- Yahoo
Decision deferred on high-rise student tower blocks by Deptford Creek
A decision on whether two high-rise blocks of student accommodation by Deptford Creek will be built has been deferred after councillors voted for a site visit. Greenwich Council's Planning Board discussed the contentious plans—which garnered 294 letters of support and 251 objections—for nearly two-and-a-half hours on Tuesday evening (May 27). Luxury student accommodation business YourTRIBE and development and investment company Redington Capital first applied for planning permission to demolish three low-rise residential buildings in Greenwich Quay and replace them with 20-storey and 15-storey student tower blocks in December 2023. These plans were reduced earlier this month, bringing the 20 storeys down to 17 and shrinking the number of beds from 700 to 598. This reduction in part was because Maritime Greenwich had objected to the plans due to the height of the development and its potential visual effect on the nearby UNESCO World Heritage Site. Maritime Greenwich withdrew its objection after the height of the tallest tower was reduced. Cllr Majella Anning, speaking on behalf of Greenwich Creekside ward where the development site is located, stated that the student provision in Creekside would increase to around 20 per cent of the ward's total population if the proposal was approved. She said: 'I am in favour of the provision of student housing in my ward. What I object to is the scale of what is being proposed and the lack of a mixed housing offer, in particular social housing for local Greenwich residents.' Cllr Anning also likened the development to a 'cash cow' and claimed that developers would pay a lower community infrastructure levy in Greenwich when compared to other London boroughs. She also called the height of the buildings 'completely inappropriate' and described them as looking 'ugly'. She added: 'Student-only tower blocks do not offer any relief to the 28,000 people on our Greenwich Council [social housing] waiting list. These are blocks of temporary accommodation, by their very definition.' Cllr Anning's fellow Creekside ward Cllr Calum O'Byrne Mulligan also spoke in opposition to the proposal. He said: 'I urge the committee to reject this application as the scale and mass of the buildings not in a tall building area go against existing council policy. 'I fear that this development risks the intangible strategic asset that we have in the world heritage site and jeopardises protected views, going against our local plan.' Scott Fitzgerald of the Millennium Quay Residents Association (a residential development nearby the proposal site) said: 'The public consultations held by YOURTribe have repeatedly failed to address reasonable concerns.' The concerns he focused on were those of access to the site via Clarence Road which measures 3.5 metres wide, and fears that the site does not have adequate space if an evacuation was needed. He said: 'This development is about short-term economic gain, not long-term community diversity… It prioritises financial return over inclusive, sustainable living and would turn Greenwich Quay into a de facto student dormitory, not a diverse residential neighbourhood.' Another Greenwich resident opposed to the plans, Charlotte Kiddie, said: 'Who benefits from this proposal? Not those on the social housing register, not local residents, not London which risks losing one of only four UNESCO sites, not Greenwich Council, unable to generate council tax, nor even the students who are being overcharged. The only party that benefits in this is the property developer.' Phoebe Juggins, senior planning manager at YOURTribe, spoke in support of the application. She said: 'We expect that through delivering 590 purpose-built student accommodation units, we will free up the equivalent of 236 homes in Greenwich, and will importantly mean that students are living in a well-managed and supportive environment. 'We want this scheme to not only invest in the education of the next generation, but to the local area, delivering £7.3 million annually to the local economy, 43 full-time jobs plus over 500 construction jobs.' Ms Juggins also responded to queries brought up by councillors and objectors, assuring that all the necessary hoops had been jumped through to ensure the development has a robust fire safety and evacuation strategy. Planning committee member Cllr David Gardner asked what students would actually be able to afford this accommodation, calculating that other rent prices offered by YOURTribe in London exceed the maximum student loan for living costs. YOURTribe director Nick Lawrence responded: 'I think it's a misnomer that all students are poor. We are having high demand for our accommodation, and in conjunction with the universities we set the rent.' Cllr David Gardner proposed a site visit because he thought the committee needed to look at 'the impact on the neighbouring development Millennium Quay'. This was seconded by Cllr Olu Babatola, who thought a site visit would help him assess the fire safety concerns raised at the meeting. The committee voted for this site visit proposal, and a final decision on whether planning permission will be granted has been deferred until after a visit has been made.
Telegraph
21-04-2025
- Sport
- Telegraph
Amber Anning interview: The letter that inspired me to become world champion
Last month, in emotional scenes inside China's Nanjing Youth Olympic Sports Park, Amber Anning stood on top of the podium after a coming-of-age performance to win 400-metre gold at the World Indoor Championships. Her stunning triumph marked a number of firsts. It was Anning's first international title, in her first professional season after years grafting away on the American college scene, and she was Britain's first-ever female winner in the event. The stars had truly aligned. Two weeks earlier, Anning's confidence had been shredded after she was disqualified from the heats at the European Indoor Championships in Apeldoorn for a lane infringement. Determined to avoid a repeat in Nanjing, she calmly recited a letter to herself before warming up. 'It was basically what I would say to the 'old Amber' and what I would say to her now,' says Anning. 'I wrote about all the sacrifices I'd made, all the events I'd missed socially, moving over to America and not wanting to feel disappointment after all the hard work I'd put in, wanting to hear the national anthem standing on the podium and going out to get what's mine. 'I wrote it at the Europeans but took the letter to the worlds and every time I read it, it put a smile on my face. It just reminded me that I had come so far and that I could go out there and achieve what I wanted to.' SHE'S DONE IT! 🥇 Great Britain's Amber Anning has won Women's 400m gold in dramatic style in Nanjing! #BBCAthletics #WorldIndoorChamps — BBC Sport (@BBCSport) March 22, 2025 Anning is speaking to Telegraph Sport from her United States training base in Arkansas, where she has returned to ready herself for the outdoor season. Unlike most emerging British talent, she made the bold decision to leave her Brighton-based family, aged 19, to make a track career for herself in the US. When she arrived at Louisiana State University on a scholarship in 2020, she was a small fish in a very big pond and began rubbing shoulders with some of the best 400m specialists in the world. Anning initially struggled to grapple with the huge cultural shock, before body-image insecurities struck. She quickly came across what it meant to be labelled 'Freshman 15' – the term is used to describe so-called weight-gain among college athletes in their first year, when they may put on up to 15 pounds. 'I wasn't running very fast and I was struggling with weight,' reflects Anning. 'The portions over here are really big and sometimes there'd be some points where I'd see myself in the mirror and just struggled with my look. 'I came to America looking really lean and really toned. When you're 18, 19, you're not developed as much in terms of lifting. During my first year, when I came back for Christmas, I don't think my parents even recognised me. 'A lot of comments were going around. I remember the team, some girls made comments that I was fat and overweight. It was mentally hard. When you're underperforming as well you've got all this stuff going on.' In her award-winning memoir Good For A Girl, Lauren Fleshman, a former middle-distance national champion, painted her own damning experience of the American college system as one severely lacking in female coaches needed to promote healthy practices. 'It can be hard to be a female sometimes,' says Anning. 'We deal with a lot, and it's about making sure that you have people around you who understand when you're on your period, you're not maybe going to be the best, like some people's are heavier than others.' Anning, though, insists her formative years in the States have been 'pretty positive' and insists the cut-throat nature of her training environments is inherently tied to her success on the track. At her maiden Olympics in Paris last year, she collected a pair of relay bronzes and finished a respectable fifth in the women's 400m final, but her career might have veered in a completely different direction after she experienced devastating loss as a teenager. The sudden passing of Anning's childhood coach, Lloyd Cowan, the esteemed trainer who masterminded Christine Ohuruogu's 2008 Olympic success in Beijing, turned Anning's world upside down. Cowan coached Anning as a junior and such was the profound influence the former Commonwealth sprint hurdler had on her career that Anning's mother helped set up the Lloyd Cowan Bursary as a way to honour his legacy after his unexpected death in 2021, which was believed to be related to Covid-19 complications. The initiative supports athletes who lack the financial means to stay in the sport. 'I was devastated,' says Anning. 'I was in a lot of disbelief. Lloyd was just such a figure and role model to me and someone who I thought would be here on this journey with me today, especially seeing what he'd done with Christine Ohuruogu. 'Those first two years [after his passing] I'd get teary even talking about it because he had such a profound impact on me. He was just such a charismatic man who had so much love and joy. At the worlds, on the podium, I was thinking, 'Lloyd, we got there! We can tick something off our list.'' How proud he would have been of his diligent pupil, who will not be parting with her lucky letter any time soon. 'It's staying in my backpack for now,' smiles Anning.
Yahoo
25-03-2025
- Sport
- Yahoo
Anning relishes view from the top after world gold
Staring out from the 61st floor, overlooking Nanjing's glass-and-steel skyline, Amber Anning could finally get the highs and lows into perspective. Two weeks before, she had been reduced to tears after disqualification for a lane infringement at the European Indoor Championships in the Netherlands. Three hours before, she had redeemed herself on the global stage in China, becoming the first British woman to win the 400m world indoor title. And, a few minutes earlier, she had lost once more. "Me, [60m world indoor champion] Jeremiah Azu and [60m finalist] Amy Hunt went up to the top floor of our hotel that evening and played cards and a little bit of music," she told BBC Sport of the end of her World Indoors campaign. "That was our celebration. It was really chill, a nice little vibe. But I actually lost every game. I was so upset! "Jeremiah won twice or three times, Amy won, I just couldn't - but at least I won the most important thing, which was the 400m." So far in her short career, Anning has tended to turn up trumps when it matters. While still a student, she won a world bronze medal with Britain's 4x400m team in Budapest. In 2024, she reached the Olympic final in Paris, breaking the legendary Christine Ohuruogu's British record en route to fifth place before picking up another two relay medals. Now, still just 24, she is an individual global champion and one of British athletics' brightest stars. Her ascent to the upper reaches of the sport has been stylish. Last summer, she surged to a championship record when she won the British title, leaving Laviai Nielsen and Jodie Williams in her slipstream. In Nanjing, on the tight bends of an indoor track, she was bumped by American Alexis Holmes with 175m to go. Anning went wide, back and, potentially, out of contention. But she regathered herself, nibbled into Holmes' lead, powered off the last bend and beat her rival on the dip. Her winning margin was just three-hundredths of a second. "With 400m you have so much time to think, it isn't like 60m where you just get it done," she said. "When I got pushed I didn't panic, I said to myself 'this is not how you visualised it, this is not the execution you wanted, but what are you going to do before now and the end to get your gold medal?' "I had to wait and be patient, stay engaged, and stay in touch with her and then time it to perfection. "When I watched it back I realised that if I had made that move even a second earlier or later, I wasn't winning. It is crazy how it works." There is a beautiful symmetry to Anning succeeding Ohuruogu as the British record holder. Lloyd Cowan, who guided Ohuruogu 's career, also coached Anning as a junior. He died in January 2021 from complications arising from a Covid-19 infection, aged 58. "He was like my track dad," said Anning. "He just gave so much warmth, it felt so homely being around him. It was such a tough loss. "I thought I would be here with him today achieving this stuff and I know he is looking down on me now and I know he would be proud. "It feels like we kept the record in the family, which is really nice." Anning's mother sits alongside Ohuruogu on the board of the Lloyd Cowan Bursary, which helps bring down financial barriers for promising young athletes and coaches who might otherwise be lost to athletics. If Cowan shaped Anning's early potential, it has been sharpened in the United States. Encouraged by her mother, Anning left the UK for Louisiana State University as a teenager. The alma mater of pole vault world record holder Armand Duplantis and 100m world champion Sha'Carri Richardson took her out of her comfort zone. "I felt I was maybe a little too comfortable over here [in the UK] and I needed that extra push," she said. "Over there, you are seeing success in your face every day. "Because it is such a big place and big population, only a small percentage are going to make it, maybe they want it that much more because they know the chances are slimmer. "I needed to take on that mentality of wanting to be the best in the world because that is the level they are at over there." It took some time. Anning admits she was "not as disciplined as I should have been" initially at Louisiana and eventually transferred to Arkansas, which had a less lively party scene, as well as a world-class 400m group. Beating Holmes, the top-ranked American over 400m, to gold is testament to her grind. There may be other high-profile opponents to consider. Sydney McLaughlin-Levrone, the all-conquering 400m hurdles superstar, clocked the seventh-fastest 400m time of 2024 in an invitational race in September and is thought to be racing on the flat in Michael Johnson's Grand Slam Track. The Netherlands' Femke Bol, another hurdles specialist, is the 400m indoor world record holder, having won gold in Glasgow last year. If they line up against her, Anning will be ready. "Let them come," she said. "I love competition, it makes everyone better, "That just means I have to do a little bit better, train harder and work out what I have to do to stay up there and on top." From the 61st floor and the top step of the podium alike, Anning likes the view.
BBC News
25-03-2025
- Sport
- BBC News
Anning relishes view from the top after world gold
Staring out from the 61st floor, overlooking Nanjing's glass-and-steel skyline, Amber Anning could finally get the highs and lows into weeks before, she had been reduced to tears after disqualification for a lane infringement at the European Indoor Championships in the hours before, she had redeemed herself on the global stage in China, becoming the first British woman to win the 400m world indoor a few minutes earlier, she had lost once more."Me, [60m world indoor champion] Jeremiah Azu and [60m finalist] Amy Hunt went up to the top floor of our hotel that evening and played cards and a little bit of music," she told BBC Sport of the end of her World Indoors campaign."That was our celebration. It was really chill, a nice little vibe. But I actually lost every game. I was so upset! "Jeremiah won twice or three times, Amy won, I just couldn't - but at least I won the most important thing, which was the 400m."So far in her short career, Anning has tended to turn up trumps when it still a student, she won a world bronze medal with Britain's 4x400m team in 2024, she reached the Olympic final in Paris, breaking the legendary Christine Ohuruogu's British record en route to fifth place before picking up another two relay still just 24, she is an individual global champion and one of British athletics' brightest stars. Her ascent to the upper reaches of the sport has been summer, she surged to a championship record when she won the British title, leaving Laviai Nielsen and Jodie Williams in her slipstream. In Nanjing, on the tight bends of an indoor track, she was bumped by American Alexis Holmes with 175m to went wide, back and, potentially, out of she regathered herself, nibbled into Holmes' lead, powered off the last bend and beat her rival on the dip. Her winning margin was just three-hundredths of a second."With 400m you have so much time to think, it isn't like 60m where you just get it done," she said."When I got pushed I didn't panic, I said to myself 'this is not how you visualised it, this is not the execution you wanted, but what are you going to do before now and the end to get your gold medal?'"I had to wait and be patient, stay engaged, and stay in touch with her and then time it to perfection."When I watched it back I realised that if I had made that move even a second earlier or later, I wasn't winning. It is crazy how it works."There is a beautiful symmetry to Anning succeeding Ohuruogu as the British record Cowan, who guided Ohuruogu 's career, also coached Anning as a junior. He died in January 2021 from complications arising from a Covid-19 infection, aged 58."He was like my track dad," said Anning. "He just gave so much warmth, it felt so homely being around him. It was such a tough loss. "I thought I would be here with him today achieving this stuff and I know he is looking down on me now and I know he would be proud."It feels like we kept the record in the family, which is really nice."Anning's mother sits alongside Ohuruogu on the board of the Lloyd Cowan Bursary, which helps bring down financial barriers for promising young athletes and coaches who might otherwise be lost to Cowan shaped Anning's early potential, it has been sharpened in the United by her mother, Anning left the UK for Louisiana State University as a alma mater of pole vault world record holder Armand Duplantis and 100m world champion Sha'Carri Richardson took her out of her comfort zone."I felt I was maybe a little too comfortable over here [in the UK] and I needed that extra push," she said."Over there, you are seeing success in your face every day."Because it is such a big place and big population, only a small percentage are going to make it, maybe they want it that much more because they know the chances are slimmer."I needed to take on that mentality of wanting to be the best in the world because that is the level they are at over there." It took some admits she was "not as disciplined as I should have been" initially at Louisiana and eventually transferred to Arkansas, which had a less lively party scene, as well as a world-class 400m Holmes, the top-ranked American over 400m, to gold is testament to her may be other high-profile opponents to McLaughlin-Levrone, the all-conquering 400m hurdles superstar, clocked the seventh-fastest 400m time of 2024 in an invitational race in September and is thought to be racing on the flat in Michael Johnson's Grand Slam Netherlands' Femke Bol, another hurdles specialist, is the 400m indoor world record holder, having won gold in Glasgow last they line up against her, Anning will be ready."Let them come," she said. "I love competition, it makes everyone better,"That just means I have to do a little bit better, train harder and work out what I have to do to stay up there and on top."From the 61st floor and the top step of the podium alike, Anning likes the view.
The Guardian
23-03-2025
- Sport
- The Guardian
Ingebrigtsen secures double gold and GB athletes enjoy day of redemption
The world indoor championships in Nanjing this year will be remembered as a story of redemption for so many of Britain's finest athletes, but as is so often the case these days on the track it was Jakob Ingebrigtsen who wrote the script. The Norwegian went into these championships in China with the chance to emulate the great Haile Gebrselassie by becoming only the second man to win 1500m and 3,000m gold in the same world indoor championships. On Saturday Ingebrigtsen stormed to a 3,000m triumph and on Sunday he delivered another imperious run when it mattered most. It was Ingebrigtsen's first world title above 1500m and underlined his position as one of the biggest stars of world athletics. There are not many who can match the 24-year-old when the stakes are highest. This was also a successful event for Great Britain, not least for Amber Anning who became Britain's first women's 400m world champion, in dramatic circumstances, to quickly put aside the painful experience she endured in Apeldoorn this month and in the process securing GB's second gold of this event. Anning was disqualified for a lane infringement in the European indoor championships that left her devastated, but in China she announced herself on the world stage by coming through a thrilling 400m final to edge out the US runner Alexis Holmes, after the pair had come together in a mid-race shove as the bell rang. Anning held her nerve and hit the final bend magnificently. 'After what happened at the Europeans, to come here and win is just an amazing feeling,' she said. 'It wasn't the cleanest race but the goal was to win and get my first individual title.' It was Britain's second gold of the championships and there were successes elsewhere later on Sunday, too. Neil Gourley was forced to sit and watch the world indoor championships in Glasgow last year from home because of an injury that left him struggling to walk, but this time around he performed brilliantly on the world stage, running 3:39.07 in the men's 1500m final to claim silver. Gourley was unable to match Ingebrigtsen in the final stretch – the winner came home in a time of 3:38.79 – but that is nothing to be disgraced by; silver represents a magnificent outcome for the Scot given the events of the past 12 months. 'I came away disappointed at the Europeans and I had a point to prove to myself,' he said. 'I'm ready for something bigger so I'm glad I came out here to prove that.' Having watched Anning and Gourley win medals, Georgia Hunter Bell would have very likely felt the pressure to write her own tale of redemption. She was the overwhelming favourite for 1500m gold in Apeldoorn but could only finish fourth after battling an ear infection that ultimately left her out of the medals. Like her teammates, she produced on the world stage, executing to perfection to take bronze in a time of 3:59.84. Sign up to The Recap The best of our sports journalism from the past seven days and a heads-up on the weekend's action after newsletter promotion The race was won by Ethiopia's Gudaf Tsegay, who led from gun to tape and finished more than four seconds ahead of the chasing field. Another Ethiopian, Diribe Welteji, won silver. '[The] 1500m is like a riddle, it can go any way, and no one knows until we start,' Hunter Bell said. 'The Europeans was the biggest loss in my career so far. I was so inspired by some of the performances in the team. I just wanted to contribute.' Elsewhere on the final day, Britain's Scott Lincoln finished 10th in the shot-put final, and Amy Hunt ran 7.11sec to finish fifth in the 60m final. Italy's Olympic bronze medallist, Mattia Furlani, took gold in the long jump, and the US closed out the championships with double gold in the men's and women's 4x400m.
