Some considerations about the twin towers project in Clapham Junction

1 min read

YES to a station redevelopment

NO to the skyscrapers in Clapham Junction

YES to a station redevelopment - NO to the skyscrapers in Clapham Junction As I wrote before, the planning application proposal to redevelop the site of Clapham Junction Station, received by Wandsworth Council, includes the construction of 2 TOWER BLOCKS OF 42 STOREYS EACH (same number of floors as Tower42 – the Natwest Tower).
We, the local residents, urge the Council to organise a wider consultation, including providing scale models within the station itself and door to door surveys addressing local residents’ concerns for the proposed development and the infrastructure required to support it (including security, parking, schools, etc).
Find below some considerations about the project:

Inadequate redevelopment of the station

  • According to Network Rail’s own information, the scheme will not answer all of the current over-crowding problems and future redevelopment will be required.
  • Almost no information exists as to the detail of the advertised plans. However it appears that the station access will be moved further away from the main crossroads with St John’s Road and will rely mainly on the footbridge.
  • There are no plans to develop the already over-crowded underpass.

High towerblock design inappropriate and confrontational

  • These shiny tower blocks will be highly visible from miles around.
  • They will overwhelm the existing community, and will be of inappropriate form, size, height, design, materials and appearance with our neighbourhood of Victorian and low rise developments.

A thousand new residents, and no planning for coping with them

  • The proposed housing consists entirely of small units, with no family housing (272 one-bedroom, 276 2-bed. and 8 3-bed. flats). Who is going to live in skyscrapers right above the busiest railway interchange in Europe? (train-spotters?)

It will make the area completely congested

  • The station is already very congested at peak times (transfers between rail services, bus, taxi, car, walking, cycling). All the evidence shows that the problems will get much worse with over 1000 additional people concentrated in this small area around the station.
  • Only 239 parking spaces will be provided for 556 new households. Will the new residents obtain residents’ permits for on street parking in the surrounding area?
  • During the 3 year duration of works, the whole area will be blighted by construction, noise, lorries, dust, etc.

The new development is the most significant landmark project in the Borough since Battersea Power Station was started 80 years ago.

You can act before it is too late: let the Council know your views!

Download our leaflet and distribute around you.

Did you like reading this article? Help us write more!

Clapham Junction Insider (formerly known as the CJAG website) has been publishing local news for over 14 years and remains committed to providing information about the local community and engaging in public interest journalism.

Our goal is to feature a wide range of community campaigns and initiatives, local societies, charities based in the area, fundraising efforts by residents, and provide assistance to residents.

We have always been dedicated to these endeavours and have no intention of changing. In fact, we would like to expand our efforts further.

Until recently, all the stories, analyses, and reports published have been made possible with the invaluable help of many volunteers. However, it requires a significant amount of time and effort, and we are frustrated that we cannot do more. There are numerous topics we would like to cover, but we require financial resources to provide regular information.

Therefore, we kindly ask our readers to consider offering financial support to sustain these efforts. Any contributions made will help support community and public interest news, as well as the expansion of our coverage in this area.

2 ways of supporting our project

Do you think what we are doing is helping the community and you want to encourage us to do more? We have set up two ways of supporting our project:

  1. Paypal: For one-off contributions, you can just use your bank card. However if you wish to encourage and support us regularly with a small amount, you will need a Paypal account to set up a monthly subscription. Click here to donate.
  2. Patreon: this is a well-known membership platform that connects content creators with supporters. Mainly, it offers financial tools that let supporters subscribe to projects that give creators a predictable income stream as they continue to create content. Click here to subscribe and support us regularly.

If you do support us in this way we'd be interested to hear what kind of articles you would like to see more of on the site – send your suggestions to the editor.

CJI editor and Clapham Junction Action Group co-founder and coordinator since 2008, Cyril has lived in Clapham Junction since 2001.
He is also funder and CEO of Habilis-Digital Ltd, a digital agency creating and managing websites and Internet solutions.