Save Catford

no not new labour, the tories or the liberal democrats, but a summary of the ‘consultation process’ that i’ve just attended

first of all i asked one of the ‘communications consultants’ from Local Dialogue (the communications company coordinating the ‘drop in’ session) as to why they continue to publicise the development as 57.1% affordable housing when in actual fact only 35.8% of it is sustainable affordable housing. Instead of just admitting they didn’t know the facts, i was provided with a barrage of consultant heavy, substance lite, rhetoric about the affordability issues of the development. Upon further pressing as to whether or not the 21.3% of ‘affordable’ housing made available under the LWI scheme would be made sustainably affordable (i.e. restrictions placed on it so it can’t be sold on in the open market after initial purchase), they pretty much down right lied and told me that they ‘were sure there would be restrictions in place to ensure that this was the case’.

Knowing full well that there was no such restrictions being made, i quoted them the relevant page number of the documentation that spelled out this fact and i was soon ushered away and told that someone who ‘know more about this stuff’ would come and talk to me. Eventually the person ‘who knew about this stuff’ arrived, upon seeing the name ‘Savils’ on his name tag, my expectations of this person knowing ‘about this stuff’ plummeted. We went through the same spiel as i’d done with the communications consultant, and arrived at exactly the same position, basically an outright lie as to the sustainability of the ‘affordable’ housing made available under the LWI scheme, i.e. an assurance that it would be retained into the future and made available to key workers on an affordable basis, which again i countered by quoting them the relevant parts of the documentation of both the developrs and the LWI scheme itself which contradicted what they had told me.Thus groundhog day arrived again and our chap from Savils went off to get someone who knew even more than him about ‘this stuff’.

Next up was a man from English Partnerships (the publicly funded body which gives the land to developers at discount prices to encourage development). Our chap from Savils remained in on the conversation and proceeded to tell the English Partnership’s person about how I was incorrect in the assertions that i had made about the lack of sustainability of this part of the affordable housing provision, the chap from Savil’s heart sunk as the english partnerhip’s person sheepishly admitted that my points were correct, and these ‘affordable homes’ did not even have to be sold to key workers in the first place, never mind retained for key worker provision in the future. I pressed him as to why they did not put restrictions in place to ensure this much needed sustainability of affordable housing, and bizarrely he went then on to say that if they did this then it would not be financially viable to the developer and they would walk away and no affordable housing would be built (the way he delivered this seemed to pretty much suggest that I would be personally responsible if that happened). Again however this was just nonsense, i pointed out that English Partnerships sells the land to the developers at a discount price, whether english partnerships in conjunction with the housing associations then decide to enforce restrictions to ensure the sustainability of the affordable proportion of homes or not, is purely a matter for English Partnerships & the housing associations, it doesn’t affect the developers profit margins in the slightest, they pay £xm for the land at the outset and that’s it, they have no ongoing interest in whether the resultant homes are retained as affordable or not. This point, after much discussion was eventually conceded, and in a remarkable u-turn in terms of justification flatly said that english partnerhsips were not a landlord so it was not in their interest to retain their interest in the affordable housing element, i.e. the quicker any key workers who buy a place in the new development (which results in them owning 50% and english partnerships owning 50%) sells it onto the open market and releases the equity that english partnerships have tied up in the place, the better

The most bizarre element of the evening however came at the end of this conversation when the chap from Savils proceeded to ask me a number of questions on how the LWI key worker scheme, on the development that he was touting, actually worked!

In between these rather depressing conversations on affordable housing, I also raised the point about the 17% increase in peak time rail usage that the development will lead to. In the transport assessment that accompanies the planning proposals the developers state that this will not cause any problems in terms of stress on the existing infrastructure as they expect rail usage to drop year on year from now until 2014 when the development is completed. I asked both the communications consultant and our chap from Savils if this was reasonable expectation, at first they both confirmed that it was, i then asked if it was a reasonable expectation in light of the comments made elsewhere in the planning documentation which talk of strategies to encourage more people to use public transport to reduce road congestion and improve environmental concerns. At this stage they began to back up against the ropes a bit, i then asked if over and above this was it a reasonable expectation in light of all the other residential developments that will be going on in Catford in the next few years which will undoubtedly lead to an increase, not a decrease, in rail passenger usage. At this stage they, resorted to a new defence which was to say that they were only going on the estimates that had been supplied to them by Network rail. Again this was quite far from the truth, Network Rail supplied them with actual passenger usage figures for the last three years, which the developers then extracted the year on year decrease (it doesn’t feel like a decrease) and bizarrely then assumed that this decrease experienced in the last two years will continue up until 2014. So onto another front, they then said that Network Rail & South Eastern had seen the transport report and had no problems with it. This may well be true, but i’m not surprised that South Eastern trains have no problems with a 17% increase in both revenue and probably a similar increase in profit giving their tendency to squeeze more and more people onto trains without providing either longer trains or more frequent services. This particular conversation ended with the good news that at least we’ll have a, nice new shiny stations, cycle path along the rail track and a new bridge, which they somehow thought, bizarrely, were mitigating factors of the original issue

Before going to this thing, I had a list of other areas i wanted to raise with them, impact on road traffic, the poor consultation process, assumptions made in the transport assessment, Milford Towers residents getting first refusal on the new social housing, the pricing of the homes & flat, but at this stage i felt it wasn’t worth it as i knew how the conversation would go, and additionally i could sense that the three people who had been assigned to me were were keen to escape, so dishearten i threw in the towel and left.

The good news however is that we get to do it all again in a couple of weeks when the council do their own drop in session for this (this one apparently was only for the development consortium)

They also mentioned that the planning committee meeting which will decide (rubber stamp) the development is scheduled for some time in May, in which 1 person out of the 10,000 people who were sent details of the planning proposal has the opportunity to speak for a massive 5 minutes at said meeting

keeping in line with the borough’s policy of announcing consultation exercises at the last minute and doing next to nothing to promote or publicise said consultation, we are brought news (via the lewisham mercury, dated 12/03/08) of a consultation session in relation to the proposed development at the catford greyhound site.

The plan to build 593 homes on the site, close to Catford and Catford Bridge railway stations, will include 330 affordable homes and a further key 130 at a lower cost for key workers

The plans, released by Lewisham council on behalf of Hyde Housing association and others, will be on show at a public drop-in session at St Dunstan’s College, Stanstead Road, Catford on Tuesday, March 18, from 4pm to 8pm. Representatives of the developers will be available on the day to answer any quesitons. For more information on the session, call Lucila or Sam on 020 7357 6606

I presume the quote in relation to the amount of affordable homes is incorrect, as the planning documentation refers to 186 affordable homes and a further 133 as part of the LWI key worker scheme, making 319 ‘affordable’ in total (although as highlighted previously on here, only 186 of these actually qualify to count as affordable, as the other 133 can be flogged off to anyone in the market at anytime), against the implied 470 affordable ones by the quote in the mercury.

The main problem again however, is like the initial consultations held prior to the planning application being submitted (and like the so called consultation exercise in relation to the proposed sculpture for catford road), the council has made no effort to publicise or promote this so called consultation exercise. I live in the area that received notification of the planning application, yet i heard nothing about the previous consultation exercise, and if i hadn’t picked up a copy of the mercury today i wouldn’t have heard anything about this one either. I was in laurence house this afternoon, and saw no notifications or notices anywhere in relation to this on any of the notice boards, nor did i receive any communication about this from the council itself, nor have i seen any notices in relation to this anywhere in Catford. Furthermore the time selected for the consultation, 4pm to 8pm on a tuesday, does not seem to me to offer a reasonable opportunity for most people to attend this.

I searched on the internet for any notifications that may have been posted about this, but found nothing to indicate that it had been (it certainly wasn’t mentioned anywhere on the Lewisham council’s website).

Interestingly however, googling on the telephone number quoted by the mercury lead me to the website of the consultants (the inappropriately named, Local Dialogue) who are running this session, who proudly display on their front page the following:-

Communicating and consulting around planning issues is an essential part of the planning process. Dialogue understands planning and development. We understand what makes communities tick. We know how to structure and implement worthwhile and meaningful communications and consultation programmes.

yeah right.

an interesting & incisive paper on urban renewal from Dave Amis

there’s a lot of good stuff in it, and i’ve quoted some of the key points from the first part of the paper below

A considerable amount of research has already been produced on gentrification, but much of it looks at it from the perspective of the agencies charged with urban renewal and the middle class incomers who are moving into working class areas. There is some research looking at the impact on the working class. However, it is fragmentary and somewhat dated, particularly when it comes to empirical information on the displacement of working class households

What can start to be put on a more concrete footing is situating the process of urban renewal in the broader context of the seeming acceptance of neo-liberalism as the naturalised background to our lives. Putting the issues of urban renewal and gentrification in a broader context is not academic posturing but an attempt to outline the scale of the challenges we face

In the 1960s there was still a sense of social obligation underpinning urban renewal in the form of slum clearance and new housing - even though too much of what was built turned out to be an abject failure. The acceptance of neo-liberalism and an increasingly competitive global environment has shifted the focus of urban renewal to making London a competitive world city that will attract investment. While there is a nod and a wink to the notion of wealth ‘trickling down’, the emphasis is on making London an attractive place to do business regardless of what it takes in social engineering.

Displacement of working class households is an inevitable part of the process of urban renewal and gentrification where the project is one marketing London as a global city and an attractive location for investment. Regardless of how it is dressed up, essentially what is happening is social cleansing aimed at removing what is seen as a redundant working class

The overall supply of social housing in London has fallen significantly over the last ten years - a net reduction of 66,058 homes or over 6,000 homes a year. Losses through the Right to Buy have totalled just over 22,500 homes over the past two years.

interesting article about how regeneration from above often results in failure and a transfer of value & resources out of the community, but instead of just stopping at that critique, this community has gone on to show how it’s possible to be done from below, in their interests

For regeneration to work, it absolutely has to involve and harness the potential of the local community by creating locally embedded responses to local needs

Jenkins laughs at the suggestion that they are trying to create a communist mini-state on the outskirts of Luton. “This is not communism - that was all top-down,” he says. “This is about community development from the grassroots up, and the creation of a micro-economy. We’re communalists, not communists

Cost of bringing up the excalibur estate to decent homes standards - £8.4m (rejected by council)

Cost of scheme to improve the environment and housing in a predominantly private sector area - £10.2m (approved by council)

I’m all for money being spent to improve all areas of the community, but it’s somewhat galling to see money being pumped into making largely cosmetic improvements to (an already fairly decent) privately owned housing and surrounding areas whilst estates like excalibur & milford towers are left to rot

(thanks to The Man From Catford for the link to the story about the excalibur estate)

Number of homeless households in lewisham as at April 2005 - 1,245

Number of homes in lewisham that have been empty for up to 6 months as at March 2005 - 1,308

Number of homes in lewisham that have been empty for between 6 and 12 months as at March 2005 - 242

Number of empty homes taken into posession by Lewisham Council under powers available to them through Empty Dwellings Management Orders (EDMO) in order to use as social housing - as at Nov 2007 - 2

the council have announced a fairly short ‘public consultation’ period to help decide what piece of sculpture will be commissioned and placed in that wee fenced off area in the road junction between Laurence house & the catford broadway theatre

as usual with any public consultation, the opportunities open for the public to actually input into the process are kept to a minimum - the consultation period runs for only 9 days, and despite information being given about the consultation on the council’s website, no information or pictures about any of the potential sculpture pieces have been provided on their website, neither was any information about the consultation or the sculptures contained in the latest edition of Lewisham Life, our so called guide to what’s going on in the borough.

There is however, a comments book inside Laurence house, where the information about the sculptures is contained, that invites the public to tick their selected choice, no provision has been made however for those who do not like any of the 4 candidates up for selection.

to save anyone the time of trudging down to laurence house, i’ve taken some photos of the candidates and noted some of the blurb in relation to each piece

‘Windfall’ by Joseph Ingleby

This sculpture is apparently designed to ‘encapsulate the spirit of Catford, ancient & modern’ and provide a ‘dynamic yet reassuring focal point’.

Joseph apparently makes work that ‘responds intuitively and sensitively to all environments’, and has a ‘universal simplicity in their abstraction’

dynamic, intuitive, respondent and sensitive are not exactly phrases i’d used to describe this piece, it’s great that it has universal simplicity, but i thought the point of the exercise was to develop something that represents something specific or special to Catford, not some abstract concept that is detached from any real connection with our community

The artist seems to have spent most of their working life in Farnham and Glasgow

‘The Rise and Fall’ by Raphael Daden

This piece was inspired by a combination of the 'the decorative spires' across the town and a ‘ripple pattern inspired by the river ravensbourne’. Furthermore it intends to ‘unify and represent elements of modern day catford’.

furthermore, ‘by day, natural light will flow through the slots and by night, LED lighting will run through it to create the impression of water’

the artist has mentioned that he would like to hold some workshops and additional community consultation to help decide whether only one of these spheres should be built at a height of 9m, or whether 3 individual ones will be built with heights of 7m, 6m & 5m

The artist seems to have spent most of their career in Nottingham and Loughborough

‘Origin of the Secret Two’ by Hsiao Chi Tsui & Kimiya Yoshikawa

this sculpture is supposed to provide a ‘welcoming strong visual impact from every angle’ and by day be a ‘bright and exciting landmark’ yet at night a ‘mysterious and spiritual’ thing

in a familiar tone, this piece represents a ‘unification of Catford’s past & present’ and takes its inspiration from things like a chandelier of the old hippodrome (1911 - 1960) and the art deco style of the broadway theatre

its ‘vibrant colour reflects Catford’s rich cultural diversity’

‘Untitled’ by Tom Cox Bisham

When Tom came to visit Catford he was ’struck by the range of buildings, with different functions’ that we had here in Catford (has he ever been outside prior to this?!), he wanted to do something which reflects this fact, however at the same time wanted to avoid ‘producing a toytown replica of the place’ erm…..

To achieve this he’s decided to go for a ‘visually stimulating group of sculptures’ which ‘not only commemorate the town but is also truly part of it’, he goes on to tell us that ‘placed in a public sphere, they would be free to spread out, and with room to breathe the traditional design elements would become more apparent’, finally he assures us that he intends to ‘create a work that will be enjoyed by the town, and that hopefully in time, will develop a fondness for the pieces’

He does seem to be pinning a lot of hope on us ‘eventually’ liking them…..

—-

I’m no art critic, and i’m sure those qualified in this area would find things of commendation in all of the pieces above, however a few things strike me about all of them:-

1. none of the artists appear to have any connection with the area whatsoever (only two of them even mention having visited the place), and i think to an extent that comes through in each of the pieces - they all look like something that has been a conception in the artist’s mind for sometime and an accompanying blurb has been rustled up to try to connect the piece with the community (a lot of the rhetoric seems like it could be applied to any town or place in britain). I would have hoped that the council would have used this as a chance to give an opportunity to local artists to come up with something which would have perhaps had more resonance with the area. Additionally it would have been nice to see the £40,000 that’s available from the council to the winning artist to create the sculpture being spent locally and been used towards encouraging local artists in the area

2. the location of the proposed sculpture is currently the fenced off area in the middle of the road between the broadway theatre and laurence house. at present it’s inaccessible to pedestrians and surrounded by roads at all sides. This area is however, in accordance with the catford town centre action plan, due to be made a fully pedestrianised area if the rerouting of the south circular behind laurence house goes ahead. This means that the potential sculptures at present have been designed predominantly for a landscape that is due to change quite radically over the next few years, and therefore it seems to be jumping the gun a bit commissioning 40 grand bits of art to go in a location that will be completely transformed in the near future

looking through the comments book, in addition to swathes of comments saying that the money should be spent on, milford towers, more affordable housing, public toilets,local education services, a public clock, some nice trees, keeping the hospital fully open, providing better child care facilities, or better provision for elderly care, by far the majority of those who expressed a choice were in favour of the ‘Origin of the Secret Two’. It will be interesting to see if the council follows the (albeit severely restricted) expressed wishes of the local people

Personally, and if forced, i’d go with Origin of the Secret Two, it’s light, bright and quite inspiring, and in my opinion would be most suited to the area when/if it becomes pedestrianised