14 storey towers approved near Lombard Road, contrary to planning documents.

1 min read

Author: Cyril Richert

drawingAnother tower of 14 storey tower at 56 – 66 Gwynne Road SW11 3UW, near Lombard Road has been approved in February (2014/5357), following a positive recommendation from planning officers.

We wrote about the proposal in a previous article HERE.

As usual, the scheme of 14 storeys is contrary to Wandsworth planning documents. The Site Specific Allocation Document (part of Wandsworth Borough Local Plan, reflecting the borough statutory policies and guidelines for planning development) has got a section dedicated to a site nearby, at 12-14 Lombard Road, SW11 (p174). It says:

Tall buildings: In accordance with Core Strategy Policy IS3d, tall buildings in this location are likely to be inappropriate. In accordance with DMPD Policy DMS4, the height at which a development in this location will be considered to be tall is 9 storeys.

In addition, another proposal of for (only) 9 storeys was refused in 2008 in the same street, for the following reason:

“The proposed development would result in an unneighbourly and substantial overdevelopment of the site, with its scale, form and massing resulting in a visually dominant and overbearing development

There is no surprise as we already know now that applicants ignore the Wandsworth planning documents (a developer for a 17 storeys in Grant Road said: “there is a number of emerging tall buildings proposed within the York Road/Lombard Road area, the Council through emerging policy in the Core Strategy acknowledges the possibility of this area becoming a ‘focal point’, where tall buildings would not be out of place“)  and are backed by the Council officers.

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.