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Brixton Somerleyton Road development, Ovalhouse and Brixton Green - funding, proposed rents etc

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Crispy said:
Full planning application available here

Plenty to read, so I'll reserve comment for now.
120 social rented flats out of 300 is not to be sneezed at.

A planning consultation exhibition will be held at the BCA for Somerleyton Road on the following dates and times
  • Tues 13 Oct 5.30pm to 8pm
  • Wed 14 Oct 12pm to 2pm
  • Sat 17 Oct 12pm to 3pm
Click to expand...

A very helpful objection already lodged 
:confused:

Ignoring that, 50% affordable units is pretty impressive :thumbs:
 
On the plus side - Nuclear Dawn is staying.

There are some very confused arguments though about Carlton Mansions in the documentation:

"The building is however, structurally sound and only needs cosmetic restoration work to revive it."

And then...

"Carlton Mansions was found to be unfit for habitation for emergency escape reasons."

BBuzz piece.
 
Tricky Skills said:
"The building is however, structurally sound and only needs cosmetic restoration work to revive it."

And then...

"Carlton Mansions was found to be unfit for habitation for emergency escape reasons."

BBuzz piece.
Click to expand...

Don't think they are confusing. A platform thirty feet up might be structurally sound, but you wouldn't live there without a safe way down.
 
SpamMisery said:
Don't think they are confusing. A platform thirty feet up might be structurally sound, but you wouldn't live there without a safe way down.
Click to expand...

Me and my community were perfectly happy there.

I havent read all the Council stuff as it increasing my blood pressure.

To set facts right. I recently looked at old emails between our lawyer and Council lawyers the gung ho city firm of Devonshires.

It was made perfectly clear that "fire risk" was an excuse. They and the Council officers involved said that if they could not get the risk to work then , as we were all in court , would pursue vacant possession on basis of the Somerleyton road project.

To make it clear. Sections of the Council Regen dept and officers wanted an empty building. They wanted the existing community out of sight.

For some officers in Regen they wanted a blank slate to work on. The existing long standing community on the site was for them a problem. They found a reason to get us out. Took them a year but they ground down an existing community.
 
As I take an interest in my area Im on the Future Brixton email list. Got this today. Thankfully Tricky Skills had warned me about the planning application.

Got as far as reading this quote from Cllr Jacko:
Cllr Jack Hopkins said, “Somerleyton Road is not just about a development providing homes and community facilities. It’s about making an investment in a community which will stand the test of time, come what may. Driven by communities for communities, I think it heralds a new way for local people, the Council and partners to work together – putting people above profit and keeping value in communities”
Click to expand...

What can I say. Restraining myself here. What a wanker.

Good to see my Ward Cllrs who supported my community not quoted.

Jacko is a little jumped up Nu Labour politician on the make. How he can come out with this shite I dont know. Well I do it all this New Labour bollox. What Jacko forgets is that its Corbyn not Blairite Kendall who won leadership.
 
Gramsci said:
For some officers in Regen they wanted a blank slate to work on. The existing long standing community on the site was for them a problem. They found a reason to get us out. Took them a year but they ground down an existing community.
Click to expand...

Jacko referenced this during the July Cressingham Cabinet meeting. He mentioned his pet Somerleyton project and rather clumsily tried to link this in with Cressingham:

"It is a lot easier to do regeneration with a blank canvas like Somerleyton Road. The process hasn’t gone right. Recognising that you already have a strong community is important."

But Somerleyton was never a blank canvas. There was a housing co-op that the Co-operative Council wanted to remove, just so that it could "support sustainable communities."

It's all a load of bollocks, Jacko.

And bollocks to them all.
 
Masterplan:

2JtCwcP.png
 
SpamMisery said:
Don't think they are confusing. A platform thirty feet up might be structurally sound, but you wouldn't live there without a safe way down.
Click to expand...

Carlton mansions was fine to live in. It had three staircases all leading to the roof, alley ways on either side with windows that opened out onto them. One quarter of the flats were on the ground floor with the second quarter one storey up - so possible to jump from in case of emergency.

The council wanted us out. We got a second official opinion on the fire risk and it was quite different from the council's man.
 
Plus I'm still not sure why Jacko has his fingers all over Somerleyton. The Steering Group initially included Pete No Seat Robbins as the Cabinet representative, the then Portfolio Holder for Housing.

When Robbins was booted out by his Larkhall ward, you would expect Cllr Matthew Bennett, the new Housing Cabinet member to take over the role.

Is Somerleyton about housing or business?

Jacko's role at Cabinet is basically to push a fluffy Tory business agenda under the guise of Nu Labour.

Speaks volumes about what Somerleyton, Pop etc are really about.
 
Crispy said:
Their words:
Click to expand...

The phrase "social or council rent levels" is what I find worrying, for the following reason: During a "resident Q & A" at Cressingham, a council functionary defined "council rents" as arrived at via the council's current borough-wide scheme for establishing those rents (which includes repayment of building loans, development costs etc) , whereas "social rents" are arrived at as a percentage of local market rents for similarly-sized and appointed housing, as are so-called "affordable rents".
This leaves Somerleyton open to councillors being tempted by the payday rather than the opportunity to trim the housing list.
 
btw - anyone spotted Brad venturing up towards Cressingham of late? Don't forget that the 'success' of the Somerleyton model has been mentioned as one to import over to the estate regeneration programme.

You poor, poor sods.
 
Gramsci said:
As I take an interest in my area Im on the Future Brixton email list. Got this today. Thankfully Tricky Skills had warned me about the planning application.

Got as far as reading this quote from Cllr Jacko:


What can I say. Restraining myself here. What a wanker.

Good to see my Ward Cllrs who supported my community not quoted.

Jacko is a little jumped up Nu Labour politician on the make. How he can come out with this shite I dont know. Well I do it all this New Labour bollox. What Jacko forgets is that its Corbyn not Blairite Kendall who won leadership.
Click to expand...

Jacko is slipping. He could have shoe-horned at least another two mentions of community into that statement.
Not that he's got a clue what the word means.
 
Tricky Skills said:
Jacko referenced this during the July Cressingham Cabinet meeting. He mentioned his pet Somerleyton project and rather clumsily tried to link this in with Cressingham:

"It is a lot easier to do regeneration with a blank canvas like Somerleyton Road. The process hasn’t gone right. Recognising that you already have a strong community is important."

But Somerleyton was never a blank canvas. There was a housing co-op that the Co-operative Council wanted to remove, just so that it could "support sustainable communities."

It's all a load of bollocks, Jacko.

And bollocks to them all.
Click to expand...

The last years of the Coop were always difficult. As the Coop was "Short Life" it was periodically necessary to lobby my Ward Cllrs to get officers to back off. Or rather those officers in Regen who wanted us out and some of the Cllrs who hated S/L.

My Ward Cllrs - Rachel, Donatus and Matt - deserve credit for always arguing our corner in difficult, for them, circumstances.

It was always playing cat and mouse with Council and finally the cat won.
 
Gramsci boohoo, he said the two statements were confused; that one could not follow the other. They are not confused as they are not mutually exclusive. Whether or not the stated reason for the removal of the community is true is a different discussion. Perhaps I misunderstood his meaning.
 
Tricky Skills said:
btw - anyone spotted Brad venturing up towards Cressingham of late? Don't forget that the 'success' of the Somerleyton model has been mentioned as one to import over to the estate regeneration programme.

You poor, poor sods.
Click to expand...

Brad and Castaing ( over at Pop) the kind of people that Nu Labour politicians can work with.
 
SpamMisery said:
Gramsci boohoo, he said the two statements were confused; that one could not follow the other. They are not confused as they are not mutually exclusive. Whether or not the stated reason for the removal of the community is true is a different discussion. Perhaps I misunderstood his meaning.
Click to expand...

What are you going on about.
 
boohoo said:
Gramsci

I think Jack Hopkins is failing to mention that it is a community they are shaping. They aren't helping the existing community - they are creating a new community carefully manufactured by the council (With huge disregard for what was already there)
Click to expand...

That disregard is absolutely essential to the model (regeneration) that they're pursuing, although they'll rarely openly state this. Paying regard to established communities would mean undermining that model and accepting the damage it has done, is doing and will continue to do.
By essentially redefining community as "something we create through housing policy", they circumvent messy arguments about the destruction their policies have wrought at Carlton; at St Agnes; at Rushcroft etc, and will wreak at Cressingham, Central Hill etc - the dismantling of actual existing communities. Communities aren't just people, Jacko. They're about people and place, and how they interact. Re-house people on "regenerated" estates, and there's absolutely no guarantee that those same people will re-cohere into the same community as before.
 
Tricky Skills said:
btw - anyone spotted Brad venturing up towards Cressingham of late? Don't forget that the 'success' of the Somerleyton model has been mentioned as one to import over to the estate regeneration programme.

You poor, poor sods.
Click to expand...

If I do spot him, he'd better duck. "Whoops, sorry! That ball-bearing was aimed at the tree-rat!".
 
Tricky Skills said:
Plus I'm still not sure why Jacko has his fingers all over Somerleyton. The Steering Group initially included Pete No Seat Robbins as the Cabinet representative, the then Portfolio Holder for Housing.

When Robbins was booted out by his Larkhall ward, you would expect Cllr Matthew Bennett, the new Housing Cabinet member to take over the role.

Is Somerleyton about housing or business?

Jacko's role at Cabinet is basically to push a fluffy Tory business agenda under the guise of Nu Labour.

Speaks volumes about what Somerleyton, Pop etc are really about.
Click to expand...

At the beginning of the Somerleyton road project it was a Coldharbour Ward Cllr who attended all the meetings.Either Rachel or Matt.

For some reason the Ward Cllrs were pushed out of it.

Never understood why. They didnt ( understandably given the nasty way one can get treated in the Labour group), ever explain why.

I got distinct feeling that the Ward Cllrs were not happy they had been sidelined. To the point that they knew as much about the project as jo blogs like me.I know they were not informed of decisions about the site until after they had been taken. They also found BG opaque.

I think the Somerleyton road project became a flagship project for the Nu Labout revitalization of the third way.
 
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SpamMisery said:
Gramsci boohoo, he said the two statements were confused; that one could not follow the other. They are not confused as they are not mutually exclusive. Whether or not the stated reason for the removal of the community is true is a different discussion. Perhaps I misunderstood his meaning.
Click to expand...

Hello Spammy *waves*.

I see what you are saying.

But read it this way:

The building only needs some cosmetic repair.

So officer workers can be there from 7am til 9pm or later.... (it will be used for theatre people who keep different hours).

However this space wasn't suitable for people to live in because the emergency exits weren't suitable.

The community was removed because of the emergency exits/fire risk but people can now spend most of their day in the building and be safe thanks to a paint job. phew.
 
boohoo said:
Hello Spammy *waves*.

I see what you are saying.

But read it this way:

The building only needs some cosmetic repair.

So officer workers can be there from 7am til 9pm or later.... (it will be used for theatre people who keep different hours).

However this space wasn't suitable for people to live in because the emergency exits weren't suitable.

The community was removed because of the emergency exits/fire risk but people can now spend most of their day in the building and be safe thanks to a paint job. phew.
Click to expand...

Do we know what the fire regulation differences are between day use and night use?
 
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