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Windrush Square, Brixton - news and discussion

teuchter said:
If anyone wants to comment on the paucity of the design or insuficient level of information:

20/02792/RUS | Community safety public realm improvement works involving the installation of 1100mm high Heritage style cannon-shaped bollards along the perimeter of Windrush Square. |

planning.lambeth.gov.uk planning.lambeth.gov.uk
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A few thoughts having looked at the detail a bit more.

The bollards specified in the application are by Safetyflex. The exact model isn't clear, but from the dimensions my guess is that they are the Truckstopper 5 - designed to stop an 18 ton truck travelling at 50mph. Interestingly, the default shroud is smooth stainless steel and a much better match to the rest of Windrush Square.

Truckstopper 5 from Safetyflex

PAS68 rated Truckstopper 5 Anti-Terrorist Security Bollards from Safetyflex
www.safetyflexbarriers.com

If this is correct then to me that seems to be an over-specification given the difficulty in getting sufficient run-up to achieve those kinds of speeds for any vehicle, let alone an HGV.

The bollards are massive too. Nearly 4ft tall and over a foot thick. As drawn they are at 1200mm and 1400mm centres - leaving gaps between them of 875mm and 1075mm respectively. To put it another way, around the main entry points to the square they're less than three bollard-widths apart. These things don't just drop into a hole either, they need a foundation trench 1200mm wide and 400mm deep.

Not only is this in contravention of the design and access statement for Windrush Square (which has a minimum 1100mm clear width between all fixed street furniture), it sets them far closer together than the manufacturer's own recommendations - which call for 1200mm gaps. It suggests to me that whoever did the setting out doesn't understand the basic arithmetic.

Then there is the exact placing of each bollard. The details around the CHL and Saltoun Road crossings are especially problematic. Windrush Square is not a level site and has been contoured so that all the main paths are step-free shallow gradients. What happens when - say - an electric wheelchair user finds a huge new bollard in the middle of a path, such as at the corner in front of BCA?

I'll stop now. I haven't even begun on the aesthetic and conceptual implications yet and I'm getting annoyed and have work to do...
 
To be fair, the only thing being assessed in this application is whether the proposal meets the requirements of the Rush Common Act which is to maintain the open nature of Rush Common. Presumably there will be a full planning application along.

Rush Common policy and guidance states that when assessing an application under the Rush Common Acts, only the effect on its open character can be taken into account. Other aspects of the aesthetics are irrelevant. There is supposed to be a presumption against any building above the land but lately the council seems to agree every Rush Common application. You could probably built a 10ft brick wall across the middle of the square and they would argue that it does not affect it's open nature.
 
Rushy said:
To be fair, the only thing being assessed in this application is whether the proposal meets the requirements of the Rush Common Act which is to maintain the open nature of Rush Common. Presumably there will be a full planning application along.

Rush Common policy and guidance states that when assessing an application under the Rush Common Acts, only the effect on its open character can be taken into account. Other aspects of the aesthetics are irrelevant. There is supposed to be a presumption against any building above the land but lately the council seems to agree every Rush Common application. You could probably built a 10ft brick wall across the middle of the square and they would argue that it does not affect it's open nature.
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You're right of course, this is a box-ticking exercise and all the detailing will get developed and assessed when they make the full application.

Nevertheless, if this is being put out for comment as the first impression of the permanent modification to a landmark public space barely a decade old, then Lambeth ought to be smart enough to expect people to give it some critique. Not least because the temporary barriers have already changed peoples' perceptions of how the space works, plus they need to be above reproach when they're looking at approvals of their own schemes!
 
*Similar threads merged and outdated poll from 2010 removed from start page. For reference, these were the results:

1598355208831.png
 
Rushy said:
To be fair, the only thing being assessed in this application is whether the proposal meets the requirements of the Rush Common Act which is to maintain the open nature of Rush Common. Presumably there will be a full planning application along.

Rush Common policy and guidance states that when assessing an application under the Rush Common Acts, only the effect on its open character can be taken into account. Other aspects of the aesthetics are irrelevant. There is supposed to be a presumption against any building above the land but lately the council seems to agree every Rush Common application. You could probably built a 10ft brick wall across the middle of the square and they would argue that it does not affect it's open nature.
Click to expand...
There isn't actually a plan that shows the full extent of where the bollards are going to be, though. Just those two extracts showing localised areas.
 
teuchter said:
There isn't actually a plan that shows the full extent of where the bollards are going to be, though. Just those two extracts showing localised areas.
Click to expand...
I'd supposed that's what the red line on the site plan was lazily trying to indicate - but it greatly wants for clarity.

There's an interesting argument to be made though about the fact that St Matthews Peace Gardens are also part of Rush Common lands, and that the original Windrush Square proposal saw the bottom of Effra Road being pedestrianised to unite the two parts. Even as implemented, the hardscape language on both sides of the road (plus the perma-sinking cobbles in the roadway) has been designed to make them at least visually seem to be continuous.

Using that logic, a big line of bollards could easily be argued to affect the open character of Rush Common.
 
Jimbeau said:
I'd supposed that's what the red line on the site plan was lazily trying to indicate - but it greatly wants for clarity.
Click to expand...
The red line is just to show the location and extent of the application site... but they've drawn it on such a small scale map, the roads are totally out of scale and it doesn't reflect the actual shape of the space.

Jimbeau said:
There's an interesting argument to be made though about the fact that St Matthews Peace Gardens are also part of Rush Common lands, and that the original Windrush Square proposal saw the bottom of Effra Road being pedestrianised to unite the two parts. Even as implemented, the hardscape language on both sides of the road (plus the perma-sinking cobbles in the roadway) has been designed to make them at least visually seem to be continuous.

Using that logic, a big line of bollards could easily be argued to affect the open character of Rush Common.
Click to expand...

I don't think a line of bollards that you can walk between and which are well below eye level really affects the "open character"... if they do, then what about all the other street furniture, trees and so on.

I do think a line of bollards of an inappropriate design could look rubbish though.
 
teuchter said:
The red line is just to show the location and extent of the application site... but they've drawn it on such a small scale map, the roads are totally out of scale and it doesn't reflect the actual shape of the space.
Click to expand...

Of course, but they've gone and stuck a bollard visual in the corner of it, which makes it more than just a site plan. But no real need to split hairs.

teuchter said:
I don't think a line of bollards that you can walk between and which are well below eye level really affects the "open character"... if they do, then what about all the other street furniture, trees and so on.
Click to expand...

It's hardly Richard Serra's Tilted Arc, but I think a legion of these buggers marching across the space will change my psychogeography of its edges. Whether the Planning Committee thinks that meets with their own subjective interpretation of 'open character' remains to be seen.
 
Jimbeau said:
You're right of course, this is a box-ticking exercise and all the detailing will get developed and assessed when they make the full application.

Nevertheless, if this is being put out for comment as the first impression of the permanent modification to a landmark public space barely a decade old, then Lambeth ought to be smart enough to expect people to give it some critique. Not least because the temporary barriers have already changed peoples' perceptions of how the space works, plus they need to be above reproach when they're looking at approvals of their own schemes!
Click to expand...
Absolutely - critique away. Just highlighting that formal comments on aesthetics and concept should go on the right application as they can be very easily ignored / lost on this RUS one. Your point about the recommended distancing between posts seems relevant to the RUS application. To be honest, it is unusual for the RUS to happen first - I wonder if there will be an FUL planning application. Maybe it is being done under special powers?

A real bug bear of mine about RUS applications is that it is not a requirement of such an application to have a plan showing which parts of the site are actually designated Rush Common land. This one doesn't bother.
 
Just had a letter from Jay Ward, Projects Manager-Public Realm, about the changes in Windrush Square. It says "Following recommendations from the Council's Police advisor on security matters, temporary measures to increase safety on and around Windrush Square were implemented ...".

Now I don't know what the threats to safety are, but I'm guessing that most other participants on this thread don't know their extent or degree either. That's in the nature of such intelligence about threats from covert organisations. But whatever the validity of such advice, once it's been given, there's no way that it's going to be dismissed by the Council. The downside is just too great. Even with a tiny risk, the Council is simply not prepared to run the slightest chance of headlines such as "Lambeth were warned of the risk of this kind of tragedy, but over-ruled their professional advisors".
 
happyshopper said:
Just had a letter from Jay Ward, Projects Manager-Public Realm, about the changes in Windrush Square. It says "Following recommendations from the Council's Police advisor on security matters, temporary measures to increase safety on and around Windrush Square were implemented ...".

Now I don't know what the threats to safety are, but I'm guessing that most other participants on this thread don't know their extent or degree either. That's in the nature of such intelligence about threats from covert organisations. But whatever the validity of such advice, once it's been given, there's no way that it's going to be dismissed by the Council. The downside is just too great. Even with a tiny risk, the Council is simply not prepared to run the slightest chance of headlines such as "Lambeth were warned of the risk of this kind of tragedy, but over-ruled their professional advisors".
Click to expand...

So you are saying if the advice is bollox the Council still have to follow it.

I did read the doc and there is no specific threat.

Since Tony Blair government telling public of the 45 minutes threat of Saddam Im sick of being told to just go along with this shit.

War was justified on Iraq by government "experts".

I have no faith in central or local government or police on matters of terrorism threats.
 
I share Gramsci's scepticism on intelligence-led public realm changes. Though I suppose when it comes to extreme right terrorists they maybe know a thing or two.

As it happens Jay Ward seems be a traffic engineer/planner., largely with TFL. Seems like he signs off LTN stuff as well as "raised traffic tables" and the like - which are (or are presented as) safety measures.

So I would like to know if all this anti-terrorism action in Windrush Square is out of a TFL traffic budget (his ex-employer by the way)?

I think a better all-round greener solution to Windrush Square would be to revert to the Victorian/Edwardian design - which had been promoted by Cllr Andy Roe back in the mid 1990s, when he pressured the Director of Environmental Services, Paul Dufflield, to have the old bus station in front of Rayliegh Hall (now BCA) demolised. Of course there would be more (double?) the space to green. They would have to fix the crappy council sprinkler system that barely keeps the grass outside the Black Cultural Archives alive.

Shrubs have the virtue of being highly resistant to the onslaught of terrorist motorists wishing to mow down crowds - in fact they probably deter them even trying. And they create oxygen and clean polluted air.

Never mind living in a bunker - led's call for a greener Brixton Central (non political of course).

934a13c4079ad41ec54e51d59f09400d.jpg
Image12-1024x653.jpg
 
It's called "Tate Library and Gardens" because those are public gardens, not a public square. They are a different thing, somewhere for people to stroll rather somewhere that gatherings and events can happen.

It would be an effective anti-terrorrist scheme because there would be no gatherings to mow down, not because some shrubs would stop a truck.

This would be providing public safety by preventing public gatherings.

Nostalgia for Victorian civic infrastructure often ignores the way the urban environment has changed since then... when they created those gardens, they would not have been in the midst of a busy traffic junction dominated by the internal combustion engine.
 
A lot of Victorian infrastructure has stood the test of tme. The Railway stations for example.

St Pancreas was under threat of demolition for years. Its been refurbished and works a a space.

The Gardens along the Embankment- put there after the Thames was narrowed to accomodate the new sewers. These still work well as public space.

So no its not nostalgic to keep some Victorian infrastructure.

The reason the Windrush square was rebuilt in way it was is that police wanted clear sight lines across the space. This is not progress imo.
 
Drummers in the square

In photos: The drummers under the Bovril sign, Windrush Square, Brixton


In photos: The drummers under the Bovril sign, Windrush Square, Brixton


In photos: The drummers under the Bovril sign, Windrush Square, Brixton
 
Recently I've seen several Lambeth "Environmental Health Officers" patrolling outside KFC, windrush square, Brixton road, electric avenue in the mornings. Lived in this area 5 years and haven't seen this kind of presence.

Their role appears to be warning/fining people for littering. Seen several vulnerable people stopped or others just walking away refusing to give details.

Whilst I don't agree with littering, I feel this parol/fine tactic by Lambeth is in poor taste, particularly given the current situation this year. Surely these resources would be better spent aiding the community rather than a cash pot.

Would appreciate if anyone has anymore information on this?

Thanks. M
 
Mld said:
Recently I've seen several Lambeth "Environmental Health Officers" patrolling outside KFC, windrush square, Brixton road, electric avenue in the mornings. Lived in this area 5 years and haven't seen this kind of presence.

Their role appears to be warning/fining people for littering. Seen several vulnerable people stopped or others just walking away refusing to give details.

Whilst I don't agree with littering, I feel this parol/fine tactic by Lambeth is in poor taste, particularly given the current situation this year. Surely these resources would be better spent aiding the community rather than a cash pot.

Would appreciate if anyone has anymore information on this?

Thanks. M
Click to expand...
They've been doing it for 3 years Love Lambeth Lots of councils have 'litter police'.
 
​



6 February 2021: Members of the community commemorate the 76th anniversary of the birth of Bob Marley at The African and Caribbean War Memorial in Windrush Square ... with inevitable consequences.
 
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