A thirty acre park in Bushey has been saved forever following a ten year campaign to take it out of developers' hands.

Stunned residents, councillors and countryside management officers put aside years of complaints to look to the future of the Bushey Manor Field as plans to hand it to the community next Thursday were finalised.

Although promised in 2001 as part of a planning application for hundreds of homes in the neighbouring former International University site it has taken a decade of “legal wrangling” to secure the land, off The Avenue.

Resident Mary Carreras, who spearheaded the campaign as the secretary of the Bushey Residents Action Group (BRAG), was one of dozens of people delighted at the decision.

She said: “After ten years and so many set backs I can hardly believe it's going to happen. There have been so many problems but at least we've got there in the end.”

In a collective statement about the decision BRAG said it was an example of “remarkable multi-agency non-political co-operation”.

Mrs Carreras will join other residents and councillors in a charitable trust that has been set up to look after the land and guarantee it is never built on.

Chairman of the Bushey and Aldenham Planning Committee, Councillor Seamus Quilty, another member of the trust, agreed the handover had taken a long time but said it was now a “win-win situation” for everyone involved.

He said the land was now “totally protected”, adding that community ownership was better than if it were handed to Hertsmere Borough Council.

Despite this, the council will oversee the trust's work for two years before villagers become independent owners of the land.

When the original plan to handover the field was made, Hertfordshire County Council's Countryside Management Service (CMS) suggested a five year plan to add benches, a football field, paths and bins to the site.

Although Andy Hardstaff, Area Manager for the CMS, said this plan was no longer applicable he said similar work would probably be done on the land.

He added: “For the last few years we haven't had any dialogue other than 'have you heard anything?' We got all excited about it at the beginning and then it was one year and two years later and we put it to the back of our minds. Then it comes and that's it.

“It's really good news.”

Bushey Park Councillor Lynne Hodgson said: “We wanted to have that field so that it can never be built on. Given the size of that development you need an amount of green space. Who knows what the trust will do with it. Even if it is just dog walkers using it it's fine.”

The official handover of the land by developer Comer Homes to the trust and Hertsmere Borough Council will take place in The Avenue on Thursday, November 6, at 3pm.