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Out with the Old... Network Rail tell businesses to vacate Atlantic Road arches

This won't necessarily make any difference to what has happened, but the National Audit Office has validated the fact that Network Rail failed in their duty to consider the wider social impact of the selling of the Arches to the private sector. The report highlights that tenant concerns were well founded, and that initiatives to support the tenants are not legally binding.

Railway arches sold off with no thought for tenants, says watchdog

It's good that the process has been put under scrutiny but sadly only serves to highlight that any scrap of 'kindness' or consideration for communities is something that big business has no longer any real and true time for when it comes to their own financial 'woes'.

What gets me is that these businesses are run by 'people'. People who forget what it is like to be human when faced by bigger picture business problems. This is a big problem, and something that many good people are possibly unwillingly complicit in every day (but that's another conversation).
 
Network rail were forced to sell off the arches by Osbourne,. when he was Chancellor, NR didn't want this..

NR "refurbishment" of the arches in Brixton pre dated the forced sell off.

Small. business are caught between increasingly greedy NR and now a new. landlord.

At meetings about the Brixton redevelopment, when NR was criticised , NR said remit was to maximize income from property to subsidize its main business providing infrastructure for public transport.

NR was mix of public and private. So expecting it to take regard of social impact begs the question is NR a publicly owned entity or not.

Imo the railway industry should be taken back into public ownership. That includes the arches . With no compensation to the sharks that bought it.

Then social impact can be democratically decided.
 
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Railway arches sold off with no thought for tenants, says watchdog

Had a read of this.

Well as many in Brixton felt NR was refurbishing the arches in Brixton with no thought for tenants.

Only after much public opposition was NR made to give existing tenants some concessions.

So the underlying issue still is should an owner of what was public asset be expected to not charge "market" rents? NR when they owned arches thought they should be able to charge "market" rents. As renting arches was secondary business to providing rail infrastructure. Income from arches would be invested in the transport system lowering costs to rail travellers.
 
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NR we’re determined to terminate the old type of lease and make any returning tenant sign a new lease which only lasts 14 years with no guarantee of a new one once it has run its course plus the rents only go up irrespective of what goes on in the economy
 
Gramsci said:
Railway arches sold off with no thought for tenants, says watchdog

Had a read of this.

Well as many in Brixton felt NR was refurbishing the arches in Brixton with no thought for tenants.

Only after much public opposition was NR made to give existing tenants some concessions.

So the underlying issue still is should an owner of what was public asset be expected to not charge "market" rents? NR when they owned arches thought they should be able to charge "market" rents. As renting arches was secondary business to providing rail infrastructure. Income from arches would be invested in the transport system lowering costs to rail travellers.
Click to expand...
It sounds like we agree on all of this?
 
mafalda said:
View attachment 164380 View attachment 164381looks like NR aren't finishing arches in line with planning conditions. All adopted planning drawings show the existing really nice polished mosaic tiling being cleaned and repaired. Looks to me like they've repaired and painted instead. Must have saved NR some cash I guess. When do you think they'll be pulling out the shrubbery as well, which also forms part of the planning documents.
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All shrubbery has been pulled on arches on Atlantic Road,corner of Brixton Road, and it’s a vast improvement.
 
JuanTwoThree said:
More on this in general:

Railway arch shops face eviction after rent rises of up to 85%
Click to expand...

The situation has been complicated as Network Rail was forced by Osbourne when he was Chancellor to sell off the arches.

The Network rail "refurbishment" of arches on Brixton Station road and Atlantic road preceded this.

Network Rail were moving towards position of this new owner. Market rents not community.

One of the arguments of NR when they evicted the business was that their primary purpose was transport. If they could maximize rents from arches this would cut costs on transport users.

They weren't there to support local community small business.

In our increasing age of cuts / austerity spin offs like small business using arches is seen as money spinner in way it would not have been seen years ago when transport system was publicly owned.

The gradual intrusion of market forces into all aspects of community life is seen in the gradual use of railway arches as income generating vehicles.
 
Network Rail is publicly owned.

It was government policy which determined that they were to sweat their property assets.

Also part of the picture though is the fact that many arch leases have simply become more valuable particularly in London due to the changing forrunes of the types of areas which have a lot of railway viaducts...mainly inner south london and to some extent east london.
 
It seems a bit strange that not all the returning tenants have moved back yet especially the wine bar as their Arches look finished , I wonder what the delay is ?
 
Meanwhile most of the arches in Herne Hill remain empty. Presumably too expensive? But i’ve also heard too big for a lot of small businesses. And given that two independent businesses closed down recently on Half Moon Lane...
 
The HH ones are empty cos they messed up and forgot to include space for an electricity substation to provide power to the shops wasn’t it?
 
Horrible raised pointing (why??) on the 'repaired' sections of brickwork though.

Prediction based on my observation of the viaduct towards Loughborough Junction: in a couple of months you will see the Budleia sprouting back out again, from those sections of new brickwork where they think they have removed it.
 
teuchter said:
Horrible raised pointing (why??) on the 'repaired' sections of brickwork though.

Prediction based on my observation of the viaduct towards Loughborough Junction: in a couple of months you will see the Budleia sprouting back out again, from those sections of new brickwork where they think they have removed it.
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Yes I agree, it’s been a cheap make over, I took a close look and the Budleia has just been cut so will be back pretty fast.
 
For a stated 38 week build program it certainly seems to be taking far more longer as the last 3 Traders ( Brixton Tools , Budget Carpets & Baron menswear ) left the 2nd week of last April so that’s 60 weeks ago !
I can’t see the project being finished this year
 
editor said:
View attachment 175271

Seamless perfection.
Click to expand...

Can I use this photo?

I did put in complaint to planning that the works had not been done to to standard that the planning application suggested and that the area is a conservation area and the works arent up to standard.

I got acknowledgement of query but no answer if I was correct.

I need to email to find out what has happened to my query.
 
Gramsci said:
Can I use this photo?

I did put in complaint to planning that the works had not been done to to standard that the planning application suggested and that the area is a conservation area and the works arent up to standard.

I got acknowledgement of query but no answer if I was correct.

I need to email to find out what has happened to my query.
Click to expand...

I too have been pondering this each time I walk past. Will be interested in the reply.

I couldn’t see a heritage conservation statement on the planning database, but it’s not unusual for repair work to be done in traditional techniques and materials but not artificially aged to match the old, the rationale being that it will age over time. There might also be conditions against using reclaimed materials on a structure such as a railway viaduct.

If it has been stated - say - that only unsound bricks will be removed and replaced with new London stocks with weatherstruck lime mortar joints at the line of the original wall face, then the contractor might have some defence, since this looks to me to have been the approach. It then becomes more a question of the quality of the workmanship.

None of this means I like the look of it (I don’t), but seamlessness might never have been the intent.
 
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