Council seek to buy Charlton land as part of “over 8,000” masterplan homes
Greenwich Council’s Cabinet look set to tonight approve plans to buy land in Charlton as part of the Charlton Riverside project to build thousands of homes.
The report states the purchase is for “over 8,000 new homes” which is possibly an insight into how total housing levels could already be planned above 8,000. The area masterplan stated 5,000 to 7,500 with the subsequent London Plan bumping that up to 8,000. Now it “over 8,000”. As we’ve seen at Greenwich Peninsula and Kidbrooke, initial levels are often sharply increased.
Land to be purchased is at 19-21 Penhall Business Park, Penhall Road and 14-18 Penhall Road, which is owned by Leopard Guernsey Anchor Holdco. The authority owns other land in the area stating:
“An important factor to take into consideration is the marriage value between the Council’s current land holdings with the Site. The Site immediately adjoins the Council’s existing ownership and automatically offer synergies that other parties would not benefit from and in turn gives the Council ‘Special Purchaser’ status.
A benefit to the Council in acquiring the Site is that it would also prevent a third party acquiring the land and permanently segregating the Council’s holdings to the North and South of Penhall Road.”
All sites would total nine acres.
Land ownership in council hands should avoid piecemeal schemes which contravene the masterplan. We saw that with the very first application from Rockwell which didn’t follow indicative street layouts which would compromise future bus routes.
The issue will be discussed at a meeting tonight alongside the Site Allocation Strategy I looked at last week. That lays out future development sites. It’s three years late, many proposed plots have already moved on and gained approval and a sizeable number of glaring mistakes are apparent. Much of it doesn’t look like it’s been touched since consultation back in 2017.
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Wonder if they will keep plans for a riverboat stop as per previous proposals by private developers
So how many stories will single mums with buggies have to climb when the lifts break down regularly in a decade or so? And how many stories to cram in to 9 acres to house 8000 people? And how much room will each family get to hide away inside from pandemics? Isn’t this not a solution to a crisis in housing, but just future high rise ghettoes? ‘How do we avoid that’ should be the questions being asked. Decent housing with decent space to build real communities and with sufficient community facilities, to avoid high crime influx for current residents to have inflicted upon them, not ‘how do we meet targets set by central Govt caused by massive influx of new residents’. management by crisis rarely works for all concerned.
It’s 6-10 floors which is a level many households live in perfectly well particularly in many European cities. Also there’s little forcing a family to move to the tallest blocks. Younger people living there could reduce the number of family homes being converted and thus freeing up homes elsewhere for families if they seek a traditional home. The plan has a central spine for new transport links, green areas and is near Maryon Park. If truly affordable, lots going for it when complete and will help many many people.
I wonder if the Housing would be 100% council owned? or would a deal be done with a developer for a slice of ownership and therefore sold/rented out at full market value?
Almost no chance it’s 100 per cent council. How Greenwich go about it will be key. Selling off to a large developer for minimal “affordable” housing will be the worst option. Working alongside Meridian/Housing Associations could provide best long term result.
Really hope it’s not a developer headed by ex-councillors, or soon to be joined by councillors.