Brent Council's noisy neighbour problem

Samantha Warrington is Property Week’s group production director

The England v Ghana friendly last night was the first time I have watched a match at Wembley – and what an entertaining and uplifting experience it was.

A carnival atmosphere emanated from the Ghanaian corner and Black Stars fans passionately waved red, gold and green flags throughout the stadium.

Wembley is a magnificent national stadium and an outstanding venue for global sporting and entertainment events, of which the FA and the entire country can be rightly proud.

But what genius decided that it would be a good idea Brent Council to have its headquarters next door, and opposite Wembley Arena, another famous crowd puller.

As the 80,000-strong crowd that was backed up all the way down Empire Way waited patiently and good-naturedly to get on the Tube – buses are diverted on event days and parking restricted – I pondered how the citizens and officers of Brent would make their way to and from the Civic Centre.

It took us nearly an hour just to get out of the immediate stadium vicinity because of the sheer volume of people.

How will a single mother and her children urgently needing to sort out her housing benefit claim or a family returning their library books battle though the crowds outside the Civic Centre on, say, the day of a crucial England v Scotland World Cup qualifier at the stadium and the WWE Smackdown at the arena?

Brent Council is cutting and relocating local services from all over the borough to its £100m trophy Civic Centre, with its "state of the art facilities" and £3m mega-library.

But if the people of Brent cannot even get to it, it is in danger of becoming an isolated white elephant – built with council taxpayers’ money.