New residential development

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giorgio_ne
Posts: 8
Joined: 27 Jan 2012 11:04
Location: Sydenham

New residential development

Post by giorgio_ne »

A new residential development has been proposed at the site of the former Masaniello Italian Restaurant.
It seems the building will somehow be extended and converted into a number of flats.
It saddens me a bit the fact the shop floor space is eroding away especially now that the high street is being redeveloped.

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Mangetout
Posts: 10
Joined: 7 Jun 2012 19:06

Re: New residential development

Post by Mangetout »

The proposed design is also very ugly and out of style with surrounding buildings.

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Tim Lund
Posts: 6718
Joined: 13 Mar 2008 18:10
Location: Silverdale

Re: New residential development

Post by Tim Lund »

Here's the application on line, and here are the drawings from the design and access statement of the before and after

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Can't say it impresses me much either, but I'd be interested to know how it could be done better.

I also note that this is for 8 new housing units, so like this other nearby development,

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it doesn't trigger a social housing requirement - and I don't think that other one's so bad, so I feel it should be possible to get something ok.

I've also been trying to find out about something called the 'New Homes Bonus', which will encourage councils to allow new housing (as if the need to reduce the housing shortage wasn't enough) - but it seems quite complex, so I don't feel I understand.

I'm also still puzzled at what seems an above London plan density - I think there will be 22 'habitable rooms' here. In connection with 18 Longton Avenue, I was told that these limits only apply to new build, which I find hard to justify. It would seem we are creating a two tier market for new housing - flats with more space, so meeting 'decent homes' standards, which are made available to social tenants, and rather smaller spaces for market tenants available as and when development opportunities crop up. It does not make sense.
Tim Lund
Posts: 6718
Joined: 13 Mar 2008 18:10
Location: Silverdale

Re: New residential development

Post by Tim Lund »

Just been digging out various numbers here, and if anyone can point out any errors or misunderstandings, well, I may not be happy to correct them :oops: - but I will.

First, this is how the business was doing - yes, maybe it could well have been better run, but I'm not sure how profitable it could have been:

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Now the alternative, from just across the road (of course, the 2 bed flats proposed here won't for £1,250 pcm, but that's the ballpark figure)

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On this density of this development, my calculations are that there are 22 habitable rooms - 3 for each of 6 2 bedroom flats, 2 for each of 2 1 bedroom flats. The site is 10.2 m by 24.3 m (thank here to Google Earth), giving 0,025 hectares, so 880 habitable rooms per hectare. (And that doesn't take into account the ground floor, which is planned to be offices for Majors Accounts & Co Ltd, an Accounting, Book-Keeping & Tax Consultancy owned by the same director)

For new build, which I've been told is all the London Plan density limits apply to, this would only be allowed in Central London, with the highest possible level of public transport access.

On the New Homes Bonus, this is what the DCLG web site has
The New Homes Bonus is a grant paid by central government to local councils for increasing the number of homes and their use.

The New Homes Bonus is paid each year for 6 years. It’s based on the amount of extra Council Tax revenue raised for new build homes, conversions and long-term empty homes brought back into use. There is also an extra payment [£350] for providing affordable homes.
So I think that means central government match funds any additional Council tax for the next six years. For that web site, there is also a link to an Excel spreadsheet listing how much every authority is getting, and also how many new housing units they allowed in the 12 months to Oct last year. Lewisham added 1,307 units, 69% of which were 'affordable'. Interestingly, it appears not to have managed to bring any empty homes back into use. I guess this could be because (1) there really aren't any empty homes other than ones only temporarily empty, (2) the timing of reporting of empty homes brought into use happens to miss this period; or (3) Lewisham officers are not very good at getting empty homes into use.

Whatever, the total amount of extra funding Lewisham has got thanks to this is £3.5 million, which includes payments due to new homes added in previous years. To put this in context, it's about a quarter of the amounts of additional annual budget cuts Lewisham were forced into last October, according to this story in the Newsshopper.
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