Hondo's plans for a huge tower on Pope's Road, Brixton and the Brixton Project

[Gramsci]

I have made it clear from the start Im against the Hondo Tower but recently Ive been concerned about way the Nour/ Stop the Tower have been going on.

They have been quite pushy recently.

I know the Hondo application is controversial. But imo the way to oppose it is straighrforward- the height goes against agreed planning guidelines.

 

[Gramsci]

From the grapevine Ive heard Cllr Simpson other half is the Leader of the Council Cllr Hopkins.

 

[editor]

I think Save Nour/ Fight the Tower are being unfair on Cllr Simpson.

She as well as Cllr Ben Kind were the two Cllrs at the last planning committee who questioned the Hondo application.

Going back on this thread it was looking like Cllr Kind and Cllr Simpson were going to reject the application at the PAC before being cut short by the Chair.

So its out of order to say she was acting as planning consultant.

But why is she blocking local campaigners?

 

[editor]

This is a fantastic read Tinkering of the Hondo Enormo-Tower application as The Brixton Project rejects plea to walk away from the Texan socialite plans

 

[wurlycurly]

A 'co-operative' council, a Texan millionaire and a community group with no scruples walk into a bar....

 

[editor]

A 'co-operative' council, a Texan millionaire and a community group with no scruples walk into a bar....

Here's the Brixton Project's 'statement of intent' -

Brixton – Statement of Intent – The Brixton Project

www.thebrixtonproject.com

Naturally it makes no mention of the fact that they are being financed by Hondo. And why are they refusing to be transparent about how much Hondo are feeding them? Where are they getting their money from?

This line made me particularly angry:

"The community’s co-designers will be drawn from Brixton’s local grassroots networks, organisations and socially focused businesses."

How the fuck are they deciding who is invited into their select club of representatives from 'Brixton’s local grassroots networks, organisations and socially focused businesses'?

Obviously Brixton's biggest website and biggest/longest running forum doesn't count, even though I'd say we're the absolute definition of a grassroots network.

 

[editor]

More about Hondo Hondo Tower threatens Lambeth’s transport policy commitments for a Brixton Overground connection

 

[editor]

The Brixton Quisling Project

 

[Gramsci]

Update



And:

I looked up Good Planners LTD which Fight the Tower say Cllr Simpson works for and Companies house says it was dissolved in 2019

GOOD PLANNERS LIMITED overview - Find and update company information - GOV.UK

GOOD PLANNERS LIMITED - Free company information from Companies House including registered office address, filing history, accounts, annual return, officers, charges, business activity

find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk

Can CH1 help out here as he is expert on Companies House info.

Looks to me Fight the Tower are criticising Cllr Simpson when the company they say she works for no longer exists.

Or have I got something wrong?

 

[editor]

Great stuff: Artist evicted from Brixton Market speaks out against Hondo’s plans to build a huge tower in the centre of Brixton

 

[CH1]

I looked up Good Planners LTD which Fight the Tower say Cllr Simpson works for and Companies house says it was dissolved in 2019

GOOD PLANNERS LIMITED overview - Find and update company information - GOV.UK

GOOD PLANNERS LIMITED - Free company information from Companies House including registered office address, filing history, accounts, annual return, officers, charges, business activity

find-and-update.company-information.service.gov.uk

Can CH1 help out here as he is expert on Companies House info.

Looks to me Fight the Tower are criticising Cllr Simpson when the company they say she works for no longer exists.

Or have I got something wrong?

Thank you for praising my insights. I really only treat the companies register as if it were Google or Duck Duck Go.

Regarding the company formerly known as Good Planners Ltd - it was indeed dissolved on 23rd April 2019.
The request to strike off/dissolve seems to have come from Cllr Simpson's husband

Regarding whether Cllr Simpson is still involved in planning work comerically - who can say?
She could be working in planning unincorporated (unlikely - in case of being sued)
She could be simply living on councillor's allowances without working for anyone at all.

If anyone has a lead on a possible employer I will check it out.

 

[editor]

Fight the tower! XR Lambeth publish statement in support of the No Hondo Tower campaign

 

[Gramsci]

Thank you for praising my insights. I really only treat the companies register as if it were Google or Duck Duck Go.

Regarding the company formerly known as Good Planners Ltd - it was indeed dissolved on 23rd April 2019.
The request to strike off/dissolve seems to have come from Cllr Simpson's husband
View attachment 236610
Regarding whether Cllr Simpson is still involved in planning work comerically - who can say?
She could be working in planning unincorporated (unlikely - in case of being sued)
She could be simply living on councillor's allowances without working for anyone at all.

If anyone has a lead on a possible employer I will check it out.

In that csse Cllr Simpson had reason to block Fight the Tower twitter. They had a go at her for working for company that no longer existed.

 

[Gramsci]

Ive got a lot of respect for the Fight the Tower/Save Nour campaign but in last few weeks Ive being getting concerned about some of the things they have been doing.

Treatment of Cllr Simpson is one of them.

The Planning Applications Committee is quasi judicial. It is not like other Council committees.

Its membership is made up according to how many seats each party has.

Its not supposed to be whipped.

It has to accept or refuse an application on planning matters.

It cannot refuse an application because Hondo are nasty Capitalists (which they are).

I thought , considering the limitiations the Cllrs on committee are under, that Cllr Ben Kind and Cllr Simpson were trying there hardest to find reasons to reject the application.

In which case they should be supported. Not have old history be dug up to have a go at one of them on twitter.

I do hope Cllr Simpson ignores this and at meeting next week questions Hondo application.

 

[cuppa tee]

Fight the tower! XR Lambeth publish statement in support of the No Hondo Tower campaign

I am told one of the leading lights of Brixton Project is also a head honcho in the local chapter of XR....must’ve been an uncomfortable position to find oneself in...

 

[editor]

Landlease FFS.

"Although McWilliams announced that he had bought Brixton market through his company Hondo Enterprises, the legal owners are two special-purpose vehicles backed by the New York hedge fund Angelo Gordon, while the fate of the Brixton arches was determined by US private equity.

Earlier this year, Lambeth council appointed Tom Branton as director of regeneration, giving an indication of its vision for the area.

Branton has previously worked for Southwark council, as project manager of the controversial Elephant & Castle regeneration scheme, carried out in partnership with the Australia-based developer Lendlease. He moved on from the council to work for Lendlease, where he was development manager on the same project, Elephant Park.

Built on the site of the demolished Heygate estate, Elephant Park includes nearly 3,000 luxury apartments, of which only 82 are social housing. Of the properties built in the first phase, most were sold to foreign investors."

'Regeneration' is too often an unfair fight between local people and global finance | Anna Minton

On Tuesday a London council decides over a 20-storey tower in Brixton – a tale familiar to cities from Manchester to Sydney, says author and academic Anna Minton

www.theguardian.com

 

[Gramsci]

 

[editor]

Update Brixton community rises up to say no to 20-storey office tower proposed by multi-millionaire Texan owner of Brixton Market

 

[wurlycurly]

View attachment 237043

This is awesome!!!!!!

 

[editor]

I see the Brixton Blog is doing their usual hedge-their-bets 'here's the arguments for and against' bollocks, and running a denigrating article with statements about "those who shout the loudest" that completely fails to make any mention that the Brixton Project are being funded by Hondo.

 

[wurlycurly]

It's just a few bland pars of mealy-mouthed nothingness in the Brixton Blog. Scandalous dereliction of duty. A controversial development of this size and impact deserves much, much more. Gramsci's live blog of the first planning meeting was much better reporting, and he did it all off the cuff. Perhaps the Brixton Blog should commission him to do some writing with stuff like 'facts' and 'information' in it.

 

[cuppa tee]

Update Brixton community rises up to say no to 20-storey office tower proposed by multi-millionaire Texan owner of Brixton Market

......didn’t see any pre-publicity for this

 

[editor]

......didn’t see any pre-publicity for this

The announcement was embargoed for 1pm which is when the Buzz article went live

 

[cuppa tee]

The announcement was embargoed for 1pm which is when the Buzz article went live

.....sorry I don’t understand, why would you organise a protest and not tell the public, rule of six ?

 

[editor]

.....sorry I don’t understand, why would you organise a protest and not tell the public, rule of six ?

I guess that if shitloads of people turned up the story would be all about 'those protesters breaking Covid rules' rather than Hondo.

 

[Gramsci]

Landlease FFS.

"Although McWilliams announced that he had bought Brixton market through his company Hondo Enterprises, the legal owners are two special-purpose vehicles backed by the New York hedge fund Angelo Gordon, while the fate of the Brixton arches was determined by US private equity.

Earlier this year, Lambeth council appointed Tom Branton as director of regeneration, giving an indication of its vision for the area.

Branton has previously worked for Southwark council, as project manager of the controversial Elephant & Castle regeneration scheme, carried out in partnership with the Australia-based developer Lendlease. He moved on from the council to work for Lendlease, where he was development manager on the same project, Elephant Park.

Built on the site of the demolished Heygate estate, Elephant Park includes nearly 3,000 luxury apartments, of which only 82 are social housing. Of the properties built in the first phase, most were sold to foreign investors."

'Regeneration' is too often an unfair fight between local people and global finance | Anna Minton

On Tuesday a London council decides over a 20-storey tower in Brixton – a tale familiar to cities from Manchester to Sydney, says author and academic Anna Minton

www.theguardian.com

Agree with her on the way that sections of local government are now working with developers rather than representing community interests.

I said that in my more recent objection. Also told my Ward Cllr this.

So good to see Anna Minton say this in Guardian. It not loony left stuff in that case.

She is also right to say:

But the story of a colourful developer at loggerheads with local activists obscures the bigger picture, which is the effect that global finance, in the shape of hedge funds, private equity and global property development companies, is having on places such as Brixton

This is also what Grace Blakely disicusses in her article I put on on the Brixton chat thread.

Basically what Grace Blakeley is saying is the globalised capital uses land/ property to make money. The power of globalised capital , as seen with Hondo, is that it can take over whole areas ( Brixton) and basically say how they will be developed.

Local authorities go along with that as it brings in desparately need inward investment.

She is also saying this was not inevitable. Previous governments ( Thatcher ) laid the groundwork for this.

The State/ local state has a role in this kind of "regeneration"

It can seem to be just how things are and just unfortunate.

Taking it away from personalities like McWilliams the underlying problem is political.

Financialization, real estate and COVID-19 in the UK

Abstract. In the UK, financialization has transformed many areas of the economy, including the housing market. The deregulation of financial markets that t

academic.oup.com

 

[Gramsci]

Had a look at the Officers report to PAC.

Agenda for Planning Applications Committee on Tuesday 3 November 2020, 7.00 pm | Lambeth Council

moderngov.lambeth.gov.uk

Brixton Project appear to have gone from the application. Now it says Hondo are looking for a lead partner for the community side of the development. So either I missed something or Brixton Project are not part of it now.

Impact Brixton are quoted as saying in email they are delighted to have chance to move into the new development.

The cosmetic improvements to the public square are laughable. What I found most irritating is that officers think they are great improvements. The same officers who at last PAC said the original design was top notch.

I stil cant see definitely whether the development will be built so that it can be retro fitted into a local energy network.

A few solar panels and trees are now included.

The addition of greenery and the pink stone seat say to me that the original brutalist design has been tinkered with to make it look more appealing. To me it looks like a tacked on concession to get it through committee. Not a well thought out total design for whole building.

Either the architect should have gone back to the drawing board and started again or they should have defended the original concept.

English Heritage and Brixton Society still object.

From the report it looks like officers are going to write a condition to keep it as office space and stop any move to change it to flats later on. How this will work I dont now. ( Rushy mentioned that officers had said they would do this earlier in thread)

The officers are still pushing argument that the adverse affect of the height of the Tower on local residential properties ( reduction of light) and on the Brixton Conservation Area are outweighed by the social/ economic benefits of the scheme.

Hondo have thrown in funding for TFL bike docking station nearby. ( where not decided yet)

Hondo really are desparate to get this.

 

[Gramsci]

Officers reports for the PAC tomorrow here:

Agenda for Planning Applications Committee on Tuesday 3 November 2020, 7.00 pm | Lambeth Council

moderngov.lambeth.gov.uk

 

[editor]

The decision is tonight - watch it live in Station Road Watch The Vote! Community event in Brixton as Lambeth decide the fate of the Hondo Tower, Tues 3rd Nov 2020

 

[editor]

Innit?