Distribution depot plan submitted for site near forthcoming Silvertown tunnel
Plans are in to create a storage and distribution depot on Anchor and Hope Lane in Charlton.
The site at Anchorage point is currently let to mobile operator EE until 2025.
With the forthcoming opening of Silvertown tunnel in 2025 it’s long been suspected that distribution warehouses would spring up either side of the Thames.
This application covers units A and B, while Unit C previously saw plans approved for “change of use from ‘data centre’ to a flexible use including provision for: Class B8 (storage and distribution)
and / or Class E(g)(iii) (industrial processes).” That was approved last month.
The site could have been a new school with a proposal signed off by Greenwich’s cabinet in 2021. That was then dropped in 2022 after the Department for Education pulled out.
North of the Thames
The growth of distribution depots has been seen either side of the Thames. One such plan north of the river saw a three-storey structure proposed in Silvertown.
However it faced considerable criticism from residents next door and the plan was changed.
Back south of the Thames and work is currently underway on a distribution depot on Tunnel Avenue in Greenwich.
Silvertown tunnel will include a dedicated lane for HGVs sharing space with buses in both directions across the Thames.
The application in Charlton states EE have not yet confirmed ending their lease in 2025, but presumably it’s a decent likelihood in order to put in plans for a change of use.
Traffic
One long time major concern with the Silvertown tunnel is an increase in traffic across Greenwich including HGVs.
In order to reach the tunnel lorries will head along an already congested and poorly designed Bugsby’s Way through retail parks either side.
Then they will head through further anti-pedestrian design in the midst of an area in line for more than 20,000 homes across the peninsula – including many sites now rising including the next stages of Greenwich Millennium Village.
Much like that three-storey block north of the Thames met opposition from neighbouring residents, Greenwich and Charlton will see an increasing issue of problems between residents and depots with adjacent lorry traffic in years to come.
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So that’s three warehouses and one new site possibly coming in 2025 when the tunnel opens bringing more lorries in addition to others that will switch? I really do wonder how it will all shake out.
More HGVs seems a given through Greenwich. Will other drivers also start heading to Woolwich and Rotherhithe crossings to avoid tolls? Then there’s the issue of both tunnels being located in the same spot in Greenwich. When Silvertown opens if more do drive from the A2 it’ll worsen problems like that with traffic from further out heading to both tunnels along the A2 and A102.
Rotherhithe needs a year’s repair time: for 2025 at least it will remain open while the traffic levels for the new tunnel stabilise, but it’s probably going to close the following year. Dartford is too costly in terms of time and petrol if you’re around the SE3 or SE10/13 locales, so I suspect the net will close sooner rather than later. Not looking forward to any of this: rising heat levels and idling traffic will take the term chokepoint far too literally.