Elephant Amenity Network Heygate Walkabout: Walking and Cycling Links in the local area

On 6th April 2011, members of Elephant Amenity Network and Southwark Living Streets took folks from Southwark Council, Make Architects and Heygate site developers Lend Lease for an extensive walk around the Heygate footprint site.

The walkabout was organised to look at the quality of current walking and cycling routes into the Heygate and Elephant & Castle from the surrounding area and to assess the potential for new routes to be created. The focus was principally on the routes south of the E&C Shopping Centre.

Elephant Amenity Network and Southwark Living Streets have produced a great PDF version of the resulting findings, suggestions and recommendations. You can download it here:

Heygate Walkabout-Report

The Crown Brandon Street SE17 1AL – valued local amenity to close on 1st May

We have recently learnt that the owners of the Crown, Terramek Ltd, have chosen to close the Crown despite strong local demand. They lost the planning argument for houses and offices on the site in 2010 but are now trying another tack.

The last day for the pub will be the 1st of May, Sunday, with a photocall at 2pm

Please come, and invite others, to celebrate 130 years of our local pub and to mourn how easy it is for developers who target pubs to close down community facilities.

Pubs get no specific protection at all under Southwark’s planning system. Despite the huge character and potential of the Crown, demolition will always remain a quicker way to get rich as the system stands.

We fear the building is now likely to be left either empty or gutted and empty for some time.

The battle for this characterful pub, which is on the draft Southwark Local List, will continue.

Massive potential for interim community use of the Heygate Estate site

The Elephant Amenity Network believes there is huge potential to bring benefits to the local community from planning for a range of temporary uses of the Heygate Estate site, harnessing the amazing natural and built resources that exist at present.

During a regeneration programme that will stretch over fifteen years from now (estimate by Lend Lease, Southwark Council’s regeneration partner)  there is a real danger that having an empty hoarded site this big will destroy the vitality and character of the Elephant and Castle.

To give a sense of the scale, the Heygate Estate site alone is equivalent to the area between Charing Cross, Leicester Square and Piccadilly Circus.

Instead of letting this resource go to waste, we believe that there is a huge range of positive meanwhile uses that will make the site vibrant and active during this long period.

This interim use is a win-win situation – it brings clear benefits to local communities through involvement, education and new facilities, and also brings benefits to the developer by improving the image of the development and by providing a tailor-made way of ensuring the ongoing involvement local schoolchildren, potential employees of the future.

Our ideas include uses to develop:

Gardening, food growing, planting and greenness projects (for local residents, schools, churches, private or public / commercial or free.) A suitable initial temporary container gardening site has been vacant since before the year 2000 and no other allotment sites are currently available. The Heygate site has 2.7ha of green space, 450+ mature trees with a range of mature fruit and nut species.

Sports and Play / Arts and Performance projects including urban sports such as free running using existing playground and walkway infrastructure, new Multi-use Green/Games Areas (MUGA)/Temporary natural play areas, performances, murals sculpture and film, and links to local community and festivals (e.g. Elefest, Carnival del Pueblo)

New routes (new and safer routes, seating and signing, to encourage increased footfall and permeability of the site)

Our ideas have been inspired by recent nationwide initiatives to make use of under-used spaces, including the previous Government’s Department of Communities and Local Government community finance proposals on making land available for community growing. Further information is available at www.meanwhilespace.com.

We have also been inspired by Argent’s projects at Kings Cross (http://www.kingscrosscentral.com/community)

If you have ideas, please let us know on elephantamenity@gmail.com.

No more football on the Elephant Park?

The Elephant Amenity Network turned out in force to try and save Elephant Park last Saturday 26 February.  We joined with the football players of the local Latin American football league and met with the ‘Southwark News’  (see here) in an effort to stop the boarding-up of the park.

The park is the site of what will eventually be the new market square; in the meantime it is to be let by Southwark Council to the developers of Oakmayne Plaza as a site compound.

The planning application for this was given 3 years ago and distinguishes itself by having no social rented or affordable housing of any kind in its 600+ units; Oakmayne offered £1m in lieu and to its shame Southwark accepted.  Since then not a word has been heard – we think that the application may be running out of time, hence the sudden activity.

Save The Crown Campaign, Brandon St

110 LOCAL BOOZERS LOST IN SOUTHWARK!!

Curious as to what we mean by ‘amenities’ in Elephant Amenity Network? Here’s a big clue!

Taken from the Save The Crown Campaign website here.

“The Crown, a much loved local boozer is threatened by developers who wish to bulldoze and rebuild with 9 flats at huge profit to themselves and huge loss to the people of Walworth. This Group has been set up to gather together all who those who think that this is wrong.

Please feel free to add your thoughts, memories, pictures. Particularly looking for old stories relating to the pub. The Crown has been at the heart of Walworth life for over 120 years, she deserves better”.

PUB CLOSURE A SOUTHWARK EPIDEMIC
Southwark News ran a story on December 9th 2010:

‘The latest campaign to save yet another local pub in Southwark will no doubt win the backing of all the political parties – but if past campaigns are anything to go by it will fail.

Already local Labour politicians have been quick to rally behind the protesters trying to stop the demolition of their beloved backstreet boozer The Crown.

The London Assembly Member Val Shawcross and ward councillor Darren Merrill are scared that this will be mark the end of real London pubs.

The campaign to save The Crown on Brandon Street in Walworth which is still popular with regulars has added emphasis as it is one of Southwark’s most historic pub.

London CAMRA (Campaign for Real Ale) chair Jane Jephcote said of The Crown “We do not know of a better example of Brewery Tiling in London.”

It is now a well now fact that this borough has seen more pubs close their doors than anywhere else in the country over the last thirteen years.

One hundred and ten boozers – almost a third – have shut since 1997, according to Treasury figures compiled by the Conservative Party during the election’.

Hello to H.A.L.A.G, the Heygate & Aylesbury Leaseholders Action Group

A new Heygate & Aylesbury Leaseholders Action Group(H.A.L.A.G) has been formed via the sterling and dedicated work of some of the remaining leaseholders awaiting their future on Heygate. They say ‘We are a group of leaseholders who have got together as a result of Southwark Council’s plans to compulsory purchase our homes in order to make way for the coming regeneration scheme. We believe that leaseholders on the Heygate and Aylesbury estates are being excluded from the benefits of the Regeneration scheme. We believe that the council’s valuations do not reflect the true market value of our homes. There is a significant difference between the council’s valuations and the price of other properties in the area. This is resulting in many of us being forced to move out of the area completely.’

You can read more about their campaign on their website here.

Southwark Council – Consultation for the lucky few

Very interesting couple of items in the latest People’s Republic of Southwark newsletter on the frustrations and secrecy surrounding Southwark Council’s attempts to actually ask people want they want regarding the question of affordable housing in the area and the future of Burgess Park. The first discretely advertised consultation is on whether the Council is any good at consultation! As the Council is not the most receptive and welcoming of local people’s actual thoughts, considerations and concerns, we thought it worth quoting the newsletter in full here to aid consultation:

CONSULTO…
It may be that some council officers really have nothing better to do than claim they’re consulting or have consulted. Extensively. The latest consultation are the planning ones and very hush hush, as Juliet Seymour of the Planning Department had sent, randomly or deliberately, information only to some people in Southwark, while the majority, who those same policies will affect, do not know they’re happening. They are not promoted on the council’s own website because that would mean anyone could see them and respond!

The first secret consultation is about how well the planning department consults.
The second one is the consultation on sustainability appraisal scoping report (part of the Affordable housing supplementary planning document)

Deadline to respond is 5pm on Friday 22nd October 2010

Extract from original email is below:

We are also currently preparing a new Supplementary Planning Document (SPD) for Affordable Housing and an affordable housing paper. The SPD and affordable housing paper will provide further guidance and information on how the council will provide good quality affordable housing. They will ensure that affordable housing contributes to creating a mix of housing of different tenures and prices throughout the borough. They will be a material consideration in deciding planning applications.

As part of this process a Sustainability Appraisal (SA) is required. The purpose of the SA and the scoping report is to promote sustainable development. The scoping report is the first stage in the Sustainability Appraisal process and sets out evidence (also known as baseline information) which describes what the borough is like now. Using the baseline information the scoping report identifies the key sustainability issues that will be addressed in the SPD and paper and identifies the indicators and baseline data which will be used to measure the impact of the SPD and paper on the area in the future.

The scoping report will be available for comment for five weeks between Friday 17 September and Friday 22 October 2010. You can tell us if you think we need to add other important issues for the borough to the Sustainability Appraisal report. All comments must be received by 5pm on Friday 22 October 2010.

The Scoping Report is available to view on the council’s website. If you have any queries please contact Alison Squires on 020 7525 5471, by email or at: Freepost SE1919/14, Planning Policy, Southwark Council, London SE1P 5EX

BURGESS PARK…
Rumour has it that originally only people / groups who live in very close physical proximity to the park were asked to join the stakeholders group. Which doesn’t explain the fact why there are any council officers within it at all, considering how few actually live in Southwark, let alone near Burgess Park. Nor does it explain Des Waters insisting that the park is not just for people in the area and people in Soutwark, but also many from other parts of London who would want to visit. There isn’t, to our knowledge, a single representative of future generations or people from Islington, Camden, Richmond etc on the stakeholder group.

Now the story seems to be different, and a number of other groups and people were invited to be vetted then voted on before they can become stakeholders. The rules this time round (not-made-up-as-they-went-along-at-all-although-there-don’t-seem-to-be-any-council-guidelines-on-stakeholders-outside-of-SCI-which-is-on-paper-super-inclusive) are that potential stakeholders have to literally compete with other potential stakeholders and convince the council officers (who-may-or-may-not-live-in-close-proximity-to-the-park) that they are worthy. And then there was democracy, a fictional creation by some Greek or other…

Expanding the Elephant Amenity Network – Can you help?

We are always looking to get as many local people and groups involved in the Elephant Amenity Network as possible. We are already a fairly diverse group of local tenants, leaseholders, traders, members of local volunteer community groups and friends of various local small parks and open spaces.  Sadly though we just don’t have as much time as we would like to go round the area chatting to others and seeing who is interested in being part of the Network.

Do you have time to spare to do any of the following useful and practical things:

* GAINING MORE SUPPORT FOR OUR CHARTER
We are looking for folks involved in their Tenants and Residents Association, local volunteer groups, community and environmental groups, youth clubs and play schemes, local traders and business associations, faith groups and so on, to introduce our ‘Charter for Community Inclusion and a Better Quality of Life for All‘ and asking these groups to support it  We can supply you with printed copies of the Charter.

* REPRESENTING YOUR GROUP IN THE NETWORK
This simply means coming to our regular monthly meeting, keeping us informed about what your group is up to and taking back to your group the chats and decisions we all make together at the meetings.

* SPREADING THE WORD ABOUT THE NETWORK
We have printed up an Elephant Amenity Network leaflet that’s available from us for spreading the word. Do you have time to take this leaflet to your group or put a few through local doors? Or can you put our leaflets in local community centres and public meeting spaces (cafes, libraries, and so on!). Can you ask local traders to display the leaflet in their windows? Every little helps. We can post or pop by with copies of the leaflet. Many thanks.

Contact us here:
elephantamenity@gmail.com

As we said, every little helps, you don’t have to go as far as the shops on Rodney Rd who made a massive vinyl copy of our leaflet and put it up in a super prominent position. Thanks folks!

Demolishing the Heygate: Public Meeting 20th July 2010

UPDATE: Read a report of the public meeting on Paul Coleman’s London blog.

A public meeting to understand what is happening to the Heygate Estate and to the first phase of the demolition plans.

The agenda for the meeting includes information regarding the surveys that the council has carried out on ecology, asbestos and the mature trees on site; the provision of heating to the residents who are still remaining on the estate; planning, building control and environmental health notices setting out how the demolition will take place.

Bring your questions and concerns on Tuesday 20 July 7pm

Heygate TRA Hall 25, Brandon St, SE17 1NE

Green light to the transformation of Elephant and Castle

On Wednesday 7th July Southwark Council has agreed to the terms of the Regeneration Agreement with Lend Lease, allowing for the £1.5bn transformation of the Elephant and Castle to begin.
Unfortunately, the agreement is not available to public scrutiny “as it contains commercially sensitive information”. Although the main points of the development proposals can be found in the Master Regeneration Plan (MRP – scroll down to item 9 Elephant and Castle – Regeneration Agreement and Disposal of Associated Land) , this is “to be considered a draft document” that is meant to evolve and change “in order to take into account the requirements of the development timeline for the Elephant and Castle”.

This means that the full details of the regeneration plan are not yet in the public domain, and that local stakeholders such as residents and shopowners are yet to be informed about items of public interest such as actual percentages of affordable and social housing, public services and amenities, and health hazards like the asbestos removal before the demolition of the Heygate.

Moreover, the demolition of the Heygate will require chopping down 450+ mature trees on the site – a veritable urban forest at the heart of Elephant, as can be seen from this aerial view.

Yet there is no mention of this in the MRP.

Southwark Council has announced that a steering group will be established “to ensure their views are considered for the life of the project” and that a consultation strategy “will be worked up over the coming months in conjunction with local stakeholders and in particular the Community Councils.”
Who will be able to join the steering group and how will this reflect the needs and desires of local stakeholders?

More information on Southwark Council website