Myatts Fields North massive £150m regeneration project

[Brixton Hatter]

I don't know how I missed this, but a massive £150m regeneration project for Myatts Fields North was announced earlier this year. The council have been thinking about it for a while (there was a consultation back in 2006/07) and there was some sort of planning exhibition last month - which I missed because we didn't have any communication about it

* build 305 new homes to replace properties that are currently in a very bad condition
* modernise and refurbish 172 existing homes
* provide 146 new affordable homes
* build 357 new homes for sale
* create new streets, green spaces and play areas
* provide a new landscaped park with a games area
* build a new community centre with indoor sport facilities
* build a new energy plant to provide more reliable and efficient heating and hot water and substantially reduce the carbon footprint of the homes
* refurbish commercial units and create a new local store
* manage and maintain all the PFI properties and open spaces for 30 years.

It's gonna take 6 years!

And be paid for with PFI credits

There's some more pictures here (PDF doc)

I havent seen any proper plans yet but the area could do with a bit of love - there's a great open space in Mostyn Gardens but it's pretty unattractive and rarely used. And some of the housing definitely needs updating. It looks like they want to open up some of the streets (which might be related to the proposed closing of some footpaths) but it does look from the plans that lots of green space is going to be built on. It also looks like Akerman Road might be diverted slightly with a redesigned green space coming right up to where the 'Camberwell Submarine' is.

(In a separate but I think related development, I've found out that the chimneys of the Camberwell submarine are to be extended by 4 meters! )

So anyone heard anything about this plan?

 

[se5]

The local Labour Party were on about it on their website http://www.vassallview.com/2010/02/myatts-north-regeneration-to-start.html in February - I think its just a basic reporting of the council press release.

Potentially could be very good for the area because as you say areas like Mostyn Gardens could be so good.

Also I think it will be a good idea that its a mix of homes to rent and to buy as walking through Myatts North of South currently they both feel like poor peoples 'ghetto' areas in a way that the surrounding streets which are a mixture of owned and rented housing dont. And hopefully they will be a bit more connected with proper streets so that people will be passing through in the course of their normal business - you have to make a special effort to go onto either Myatts South or North now and so they feell different and apart whereas to my mind social/ council housing (whatever you want to call it) shouldnt look different or be located any differently to other housing.

Not sure about PFI but if its the only way of getting the money I guess Lambeth dont have much choice

 

[agricola]

TBH a £114 million PFI deal for the Myatts should set everyones alarm bells ringing, the catch must either be everyone there gets kicked out in favour for rich people, or (or more likely "and") that they have Lambeth Council (and therefore we taxpayers) over the barrel for a very, very long time.

 

[ericjarvis]

The thing to watch out for is the long term funding to keep things running after the initial regeneration. That's the problem here on Angell Town. Because a lot of money was spent on doing the estate up the attitude of a lot of council officers is that we've had our share, and we should now be screwed into the ground until the estate is a complete mess again. New development is fine, but not a lot of use without the resources to look after it.

 

[Gramsci]

TBH a £114 million PFI deal for the Myatts should set everyones alarm bells ringing, the catch must either be everyone there gets kicked out in favour for rich people, or (or more likely "and") that they have Lambeth Council (and therefore we taxpayers) over the barrel for a very, very long time.

Its got New Labour all over it.This is led by Regenter ,who according to there website are set up purely to lead PFI schemes.

http://www.regenter.com/

I cant work out whether there will be a loss in affordable homes on the site. How many will be affordable rented and how many shared ownership (Shared ownership counts as affordable).

Also looks like the percentage of affordable isnt that much different from a private developers.

Also its important to note that what counts as "affordable" housing is a broad definition.

On large developments a certain amount of the housing has to be "affordable". However one development near me the affordable element is those flats let at 20% less than the flats for private rent on the development.

Also its normal for developments to have separate blocks for the "affordable" housing. Instead of "pepperpotting" affordable and private housing. That is putting houses and flats next to each other which are identical. One for private rent/ sale the other "Affordable".

So will the people being consulted on the estate remain Council tenants?With the rights of Council tenants? Will rents really be "affordable" in the long run?

 

[Laughing Toad]

(I'm glad you put the quotation marks around "affordable". As I see it anything which people can purchase without assistance is affordable, and anything which they need a subsidy to purchase is unaffordable. It's confusing to call unaffordable housing affordable. We should call all subsidised housing, 'Subsidised Housing'.)

 

[agricola]

So will the people being consulted on the estate remain Council tenants?With the rights of Council tenants? Will rents really be "affordable" in the long run?

Nope - from the Regenter article on the Myatts:

The project involves a full masterplanning solution to regenerate the Myatts Field North housing estate in Lambeth, London, comprising the demolition and re-provision of 305 council properties, the refurbishment of 172 council properties, a new community centre and sports facilities, new and enhanced public open spaces, refurbishment of eight small retail units, and construction of a new retail unit. In addition, the project will provide 503 new homes split between 357 open market sale properties, 41 intermediate affordable properties and 105 social rented properties.

So it looks like about 40% of the estate will be council (assuming of course that the 305 council homes arent "re-provisioned" into something other than council homes), 30% will be new homes for sale, and the rest will be social housing (either part-rent / part buy, or rented) run by Notting Hill.

 

[Gramsci]

Regenter say that,

"The project involves a full masterplanning solution to regenerate the Myatts Field North housing estate in Lambeth, London, comprising the demolition and re-provision of 305 council properties, the refurbishment of 172 council properties, a new community centre and sports facilities, new and enhanced public open spaces, refurbishment of eight small retail units, and construction of a new retail unit. In addition, the project will provide 503 new homes split between 357 open market sale properties, 41 intermediate affordable properties and 105 social rented properties."

Not sure how to read this. Seems to me that the first two figure ( 305 and 172) are the old estate which will be demolished or refurbished.

Then Regenter say they will provide community facilities. The "in addition" means in addition to the community facilities they will build.

Therefore the 503 number of homes is the actual figure that there will be in the new estate.

This seems to correlate with another scheme i looked at a while back by a RSL. They were going to demolish the old estate and replace it with proportions similar to this.

The private sales would subsidise the rest of the project. I assume.

I notice Notting Hill Housing Trust are going to pre buy the affordable housing units.

I not sure how this PFI scheme works in practise. Where does the money from the private sales go?

If Notting Hill Housing Trust are buying the affordable housing what is the point of a PFI scheme?

The Council could have got an RSL and private builder in to demolish and rebuild the estate wihtout a PFI scheme i would thought.

The sale of land to a developer plus Section16 could have funded the new community facilities. The rest of the land could have been sold to an RSL at a discount to provide affordable housing.

 

[Brixton Hatter]

Yes, the "affordable" housing question has been discussed on here plenty before and you have to worry that the scheme is a way of building loads of new private housing for profit, under the guise of a public building programme. I guess this is inevitable these days, but you certainly dont want to see an overall reduction in the amount of council housing. Also, the part-ownership schemes are really expensive too and rarely a good deal overall for the 'owners'. The reason consortiums like Regenter get involved in developments like this is they can make huge profits in the long run.

I not sure how this PFI scheme works in practise. Where does the money from the private sales go?

Under a PFI scheme, the private sector (Regenter, in this case) puts up the money for the development and own the new development. They then lease it back to Lambeth Council over a long period of time - typically 25 or 30 years - at which time ownership reverts to the council/public sector again.

I don't know the exact figures but I know PFI is extremely expensive - so if the scheme costs £150m, Lambeth might pay (for example) £10m a year over 30 years - £300m in total. So it's very expensive for the public sector and very profitable for the private sector. The advantage is that Lambeth don't have to shell out all the money up front but still get new 'stuff'....though it is expensive in the long term. And there's an ongoing saga of stories relating to PFI schemes - which get ever more expensive due to various cock ups, poor service etc. Just have a look at any back issues of Private Eye, or a quick search on google, to find some PFI stories which will make your eyes water.

PFI schemes are also "off book" in Government accounting, meaning that PFI debts dont show up in public deficits. (This is one of the reasons nu Labour loves PFI so much.)

In terms of where the money from the private sales go, my educated guess would be it goes direct to the developer.


What do people think of the 'plans'? I've struggled from the pictures to work out exactly what is being built where....perhaps they havent decided yet.

 

[Brixton Hatter]

The thing to watch out for is the long term funding to keep things running after the initial regeneration. That's the problem here on Angell Town. Because a lot of money was spent on doing the estate up the attitude of a lot of council officers is that we've had our share, and we should now be screwed into the ground until the estate is a complete mess again. New development is fine, but not a lot of use without the resources to look after it.

Angell Town looks pretty good these days - esp since the play area etc has been refurbished - and I've even seen people (who I guess are officers from the council) showing visitors around at the weekends and remarking what a clean, modern housing estate it is.

What sort of problems have you had there since the refurb?

 

[ericjarvis]

Angell Town looks pretty good these days - esp since the play area etc has been refurbished - and I've even seen people (who I guess are officers from the council) showing visitors around at the weekends and remarking what a clean, modern housing estate it is.

What sort of problems have you had there since the refurb?

There's a load of work needs doing on streetlights that there's no budget for. There are a couple of blocks with solar panel roofs, and there is no budget for maintaining them. Two of the blocks are developing a damp problem that there's no budget to sort out. There is no community centre of any kind on the estate. Currently Lambeth is trying to find a way of selling off the building that is earmarked to be a community centre (if we ever actually get the funding).

There's an agreed programme of a million quid of further work that's on hold because Lambeth withdrew the funding when we took the argument over allowances into arbitration (on the record they claim there is no connection, off the record we were threatened with the money being withdrawn and then it was). In the last three years the allowances for the estate have been reduced from £900,000pa to £600,000pa. Were we to actually spend within those limits the estate would be cleaned even less effectively than the Loughborough is, there would be no money to pay for gardening in the public areas, there wouldn't be enough money to renovate and relet voids, we'd probably also have to pretty much give up on anything other than urgent structural repairs.

The estate is mentioned as part of just about every course on urban regeneration in the world. It's used by the council as their ideal example of estate refurbishment, of tenant's involvement, and of sustainability. Meanwhile other parts of the council are doing their level best to deprive the estate of as much funding as possible seemingly on the grounds that we've had some money from central government so we should be screwed as hard as possible by Lambeth to make up for it.

Angry? You don't know the half of it. I'm being very calm and reasonable here. You should hear some of the firebrands on the estate getting upset.

 

[Gramsci]

Thanks for that informativer post Brixton Hatter. Ive read Private Eye on this. I cant believe the Council are doing this and making such a song and dance about it. If the Government impose it on them as the only way to get funding fair enough. But the Labout Council seem to be true believers when it comes down to schemes like this. Despite the evidence to contrary.

Interesting post from ericjarvis. Ive been hearing that allowances have been cut for TMOs.

Does these cuts in allowances have anything to do with the fiasco of the ALMO? I have heard that is the reason.

 

[ericjarvis]

Thanks for that informativer post Brixton Hatter. Ive read Private Eye on this. I cant believe the Council are doing this and making such a song and dance about it. If the Government impose it on them as the only way to get funding fair enough. But the Labout Council seem to be true believers when it comes down to schemes like this. Despite the evidence to contrary.

Interesting post from ericjarvis. Ive been hearing that allowances have been cut for TMOs.

Does these cuts in allowances have anything to do with the fiasco of the ALMO? I have heard that is the reason.

Let's put it this way. The Housing Revenue Account has to be split between the TMOs and the ALMO. So what Lambeth have done is split it on the basis of what was budgeted, and then ignored the fact that Lambeth Living overspent by several million quid. Meanwhile they have been coming down heavily on TMOs to prevent them overspending. That way they can make the ALMO appear less of a mess, and blame all the problems elsewhere on the TMOs.

It's not only a complete farce. It's bordering on serious misconduct. There doesn't appear to be any understanding in either Lambeth Living or Lambeth Council about how the two organisations should operate separately. That's led to a number of situations where Lambeth Living staff have taken on roles relating to TMOs that are legally solely the preserve of the council. There's a serious problem that may well blow up in a few people's faces over the next few months as it starts getting tested legally.

It's not an ALMO. It's barely a Finger's Breadth Management Organisation.

 

[Gramsci]

What a mess. I take it that the ALMO only is supposed to cover stock that is not part of TMO. The TMO managed stock is separate from the ALMO?

Why do the Labour Council do this. I find it strange that New Labour mantra was to move away from being ideological to doing what works. Now they have been in power in Councils and Westminster its almost that ALMOs,PFI and PPP are ideological commitments by "loyal" Labour Councils. You show your loyalty to the cause by promoting them even when your core ote never asked for this.

It wasnt as if Council tenants were clamouring for an ALMO.

 

[Brixton Hatter]

Have managed to find plans on the Lambeth planning database. It looks like most of the new flats will be built right on top of Mostyn Gardens, resulting in a huge loss of green space.

PDF here - (quite a big file 5mb)

 

[Brixton Hatter]

This development has now been approved - which means Mostyn Gardens will be built upon with massive four-storey blocks of flats. The locals who live around the area aren't happy, especially because there was no consultation beyond those currently living in the Myatts North Estate (who were IMO bought off with pictures of shiny new flats and exhibitions showing how great their new kitchens would look.) Councillors on the planning committee even commented on the lack of consultation but approved the development anyway

Now the developer (Higgins Construction - who are building the new flats around Robsart Steet / Slade Gardens) are applying for permission to vary the section 106 agreement. I'm not quite sure what this means but it says "the change would allow up to 105 of the additional social rented units to be transferred to intermediate tenure." It sounds to me like some of the proposed social housing will in fact end up being sold privately, thereby increasing the profits for the developer. Hardly surprising...and exactly as I predicted previously. Happy to be corrected though - does anyone know what this means?

 

[Gramsci]

Sounds the same trick that Tescos are pulling over the Streathem development. Agree one Section 106 and then go back to Council some time later. Say its unaffordable in present economic climate and demand the Section 106 is changed. Or u will pull out of scheme.

Developers are past masters at this kind of thing.

 

[ShiftyBagLady]

I will be really really sad to see that green space built on. Sticking another block of flats there is not a good idea, IMO.
Does it make clear how many if the flats will be suitable for families? I seem to remember people were unhappy because the majority were one and two bedroom flats with not very much provision for families (there are many many families and four primary schools within five minutes walk of the site)

 

[Brixton Hatter]

I will be really really sad to see that green space built on. Sticking another block of flats there is not a good idea, IMO.
Does it make clear how many if the flats will be suitable for families? I seem to remember people were unhappy because the majority were one and two bedroom flats with not very much provision for families (there are many many families and four primary schools within five minutes walk of the site)

There are a mixture of sizes of dwelling (if I remember correctly) from 1 to 3 bedrooms. Many of the new homes will be for sale on the private market or 'affordable housing' (sic) which of course will be beyond the reach of many families. It's pretty clear from the pictures on the developers' website who they expect to be moving in:

# build 305 new homes to replace properties that are currently in a very bad condition
# modernise and refurbish 172 existing homes
# provide 146 new affordable homes (which the developers now want to be able to sell privately)
# build 357 new homes for sale

 

[editor]

Huge new development planned for Myatt's Field, Lambeth, SW9/SE5

It talks the talk.. but does it walk the walk?

Myatt's Field will provide a new neighbourhood that is fully integrated into the surrounding area based on traditional street patterns and a hierarchy of public open spaces that are well overlooked, attractive and safe, including a range of housing within a sustainable environment.

The major focus of the project is on the public realm and new open spaces. The creation of a new central park is at the heart of the regeneration proposals. Creating a new streetscape hierarchy, an ecological, art and play strategy will further enhance the sustainable design.

http://www.prparchitects.co.uk/our-services/landscape/projects/uk/myatts-field-lambeth.html

http://www.lambeth.gov.uk/Services/HousingPlanning/MyattsFieldNorthRedevelopment.htm

 

[Dheffo]

Bit of a shame to see more green space being gobbled up :/

 

[miss minnie]

I daresay there will be room for a few more Tescos.

 

[boohoo]

yuck - looks soul less.. 146 new 'affordable housing' and 357 new homes for sale... well that should change the area!

 

[lordnoise]

I can see an office complex of some sort. Where are the homes please ?

 

[Onket]

Looks terrible. What a surprise.

 

[Thimble Queen]

I'm not clear? Are they building this on top of Mostyn Gardens or on top of Myatt's Field Park - I thought MFP was protected as part of a conservation area?

 

[editor]

Impossible to work out from the truly vile website: http://www.regenter.com/

 

[Thimble Queen]

They better not get rid of the submarine

 

[mrkikiet]

I daresay there will be room for a few more Tescos.

Two Metro's minimum in a complex of that size, possibly a Tesco nursery as well.

This is what the consortium will provide

refurbish commercial units and create a new local store

 

[wtfftw]

It's only the estate side of the submarine surely? So mostyn gardens. (((my hill)))