Anew law requiring landlords in three Brent wards to pay for a selective licence will come into force on 1 August 2023.
Landlords who rent out properties in Dollis Hill, Harlesden & Kensal Green and Willesden Green, will legally be required to have a licence from 1 August.
A licence will cost £640 for up to five years. Anyone who applied in the next few weeks before 1 August will be able to purchase a licence at the current rate of £540.
Dollis Hill, Harlesden & Kensal Green and Willesden Green were selected for licensing following a borough-wide consultation that began in autumn 2022. A report to cabinet members showed that a selective licensing scheme would have a positive impact on poor property conditions and high levels of antisocial behaviour in the three areas.
Cllr Promise Knight, Cabinet Member for Housing, Homelessness and Renters’ Security, said:
The landlords who work with us take pride in renting out properties that offer decent facilities and living conditions to tenants. The licensing scheme supports landlords in offering the best they can to tenants, ensuring that tenants’ safety and security are protected.
We encourage landlords and agents with properties in Dollis Hill, Harlesden & Kensal Green and Willesden Green to apply for a licence as soon as possible.
Thank you for joining me again, on this third stage
of our journey through the history of “the Welsh Harp” (our local reservoir –
not the musical instrument!). In Part 2, we saw how the enterprise of W.P. Warner
had made the name of his tavern synonymous with the reservoir beside it. This
time we’ll explore changes, on and around the reservoir, into the 20th
century.
1. The Kingsbury dam and its overflow,
c.1900. (Brent Archives online image 1341)
At first, not much changed. The area of water was
mainly surrounded by the meadows of local farms, and attracted visitors to the
countryside just beyond the expanding urban sprawl of London. Water flowing
over the dam to feed the River Brent was a popular sight, across the fields of
Gravel Pit Farm at Neasden. West Hendon had developed slightly, but there was
still lots of open space nearby.
2. Cool Oak Lane, with its causeway and
bridge across the reservoir's northern arm, c.1900. (Barnet Local
Studies Centre image 3284)
The Metropolitan Railway’s Neasden Works expanded, with a new power station to supply its
electric trains, which were introduced from 1905. The Canal Company, which
still owned the reservoir, refused to let the Metropolitan use water from its
Feeder for cooling purposes, so they had to sink two wells for that purpose. It
was the First World War that finally brought more industry to the area.
The airfield at Hendon already had a small aircraft
factory, run by the Grahame-White company, when the war broke out in 1914.
Other companies making planes for the rapidly developing aerial warfare were
soon active in the area, such as the Aircraft Manufacturing Company (“Airco”) in Colindale and Kingsbury, Handley Page
in Cricklewood and later Hooper & Co in North Wembley. In 1917, Handley Page designed a prototype
seaplane, hoping to sell it to the Royal Navy, and their R200 was test-flown
from the Welsh Harp. They did not receive an order, so
the seaplane never went into production.
3. Scale drawings of the Handley Page R200
seaplane. (Courtesy of the R.A.F. Museum, Hendon)
By 1917, the slopes of Dollis Hill down to the
reservoir were also the home of the Mechanical Warfare Department. Its role was
to design and test tanks, for use to try and break the trench warfare stalemate
on the war’s western front. By 1918, one of the designs it was working on was a
modified version of the Mark IX tank, and on a misty morning in November 1918
the world’s first amphibious tank was tested on the Welsh Harp reservoir.
4. A Mark IX amphibious tank entering the
Welsh Harp, November 1918. (Image from the Tank Museum)
Earlier this year, a friend interested in military
history sent me a link to a short film that includes (at the end) footage of
this test. It had been used as part of a French article on First World War
tanks, and was described as a ‘Duck Tank being tested on the pond of Dolly
Hill’! This “top secret” Department remained at Dollis Hill until 1921, before
being moved to Hampshire. Its main buildings, surrounded by a high wall, were
in the Humber Road area. It is remembered in the street name, Tankridge Road,
and a section of the wall remains at Walton Close.
5. Remaining section of Mechanical Warfare
Department wall, Walton Close, Dollis Hill, c.2010.
6. Aerial view of the reservoir in 1919,
with West Hendon beneath the plane’s wing, and Dollis Hill beyond.
The local aircraft industry was badly hit when the
Government scrapped its contracts for planes once the war had ended. One
company at Hendon made use of the unwanted aircraft to offer pleasure flights
to paying customers. The photograph above appeared with an article on the
subject in “Flight” magazine, in June 1919, and shows a view across the
reservoir to Dollis Hill.
7. The railway viaduct, seen from the
Edgware Road bridge, 1921. (Barnet Local Studies Centre image 871)
The 19th century had seen first canals,
then railways, develop as important methods of transport. This scene from 1921,
of the Midland Railway viaduct crossing the eastern arm of the reservoir, was
soon to change dramatically as the rise of motor vehicles meant a need for
better roads. The North Circular Road was constructed during the 1920s to help
heavy commercial traffic avoid having to drive through Central London. Its
proposed route would take it just south of the Welsh Harp, and by 1926 this
section of the reservoir was filled in, and the River Brent put into a culvert,
so that the road could pass under the brick arches of the viaduct.
8. New housing at Dollis Hill, and over the
reservoir at Kingsbury, late 1920s. (Brent Archives image 570)
The construction of the North Circular Road opened
up the northern slopes of Dollis Hill for development, and by the late 1920s
new streets were appearing between Brook Road and Links Road. These can be seen
in the photograph above, together with what must be the start of the Post
Office Research Centre at the top of the hill. Across the reservoir, new
suburban homes were also being built in the Church Lane and Wood Lane areas of
Kingsbury. In 1928, Willesden Urban District Council bought 40 acres of land on
the Kingsbury side of the Welsh Harp, planning to use it as a cemetery, which
would lead to disputes that lasted until 1965!
The rapidly growing population at Neasden and
Dollis Hill prompted Willesden Council to open a recreation ground on their
side of the Welsh Harp. They also built a Neasden branch library, overlooking
it, at the corner of Aboyne Road and the North Circular, which opened in 1931.
In keeping with a growing fashion for open air activity, this had a reading
terrace at first floor level.
9. The reading terrace at Neasden Library,
1931. (Brent Archives online image 2926)
One of the open air activities which had grown in
popularity at the Welsh Harp during the 1920s was “sunbathing”, although it was
not popular with everyone. By 1930, there was growing opposition among local
residents to the visitors who came to the reservoir’s banks to bathe in the
nude. One man complained to the Council that, while walking home to the Edgware
Road from Old Kingsbury Church on a Sunday evening, they had come across ‘a
bunch of stark naked men…. Hardly a pleasant sight for a man to have to pass
with his wife!’
Matters came to a head one weekend in June 1930,
when 40 men and women of the Sun-Ray Club (‘some wore no clothes, others wore
slips or bathing drawers’) were confronted by a crowd of around 200 local
people. Despite the presence of four policemen, who told them that the
sunbathers were on private land, with permission from the owner, and that they
had no right to interfere, the crowd attacked the bathers and drove them away.
Kingsbury Council dealt with the issue in a more dignified way, when they
received a deputation (not a new idea) from the National Sun and Air
Association in May 1931, although they also decided against sunbathing!
10. Extract from the minutes of a Kingsbury
Urban District Council meeting on 6 May 1931. (Brent Archives)
On the reservoir itself, the Brent Sailing Club was
formed at the Old Welsh Harp Inn in 1930. A less tranquil use of the water also
began the same year, when the London Motor Boat Club held its first speedboat
racing event at the Welsh Harp. Larger speedboats were also used to give thrill
rides for paying customers, as shown in this newsreel film from 1932.
11. A motor boat race on the Welsh Harp
reservoir in 1937. (From the collection of the late Geoffrey Hewlett)
The 1931 speedboat racing season had celebrity
guests at its opening, the aviator Amy Johnson and actress Anna Neagle. Amy had lived at Roe
Green for nine months, before the solo flight to Australia that made her
famous, and then had a flat at Vernon Court in Hendon Way. By coincidence, it
was Anna Neagle who starred as Amy Johnson in a film about her life, after her
tragic death in 1941, while flying as a wartime pilot in the Air Transport
Auxiliary.
12. Anna Neagle and Amy Johnson at the Welsh
Harp, April 1931. (From: ‘Amy Johnson – Queen of the Air’)
The south-east corner of the reservoir saw rapid
industrial development along its main roads, and on the reclaimed land, in the
late 1920s and through the 1930s. One of the factories by the junction of the
North Circular and Edgware Roads made mattresses. The company was Staples, and
the busy corner was soon known by that name. The traffic lights here became
well-known for the jams that built up, as seen below in 1937.
13. Staples Corner in 1937, with the mattress
factory bottom left. (Barnet Local Studies Centre image 4920)
When war came again in 1939, Dollis
Hill again had a part to play. Secret underground bunkers were built for the
Admiralty at its Citadel office building, on the corner of the Edgware Road and
Oxgate Lane, and for the Cabinet at “Paddock”, beneath the Post Office Research
Station in Brook Road. It was rumoured that a flying boat was moored on the
Welsh Harp, ready to fly Churchill and other key leaders to safety from their
reserve War Room if necessary, but I have no proof for that story. It was the
research station that developed the first electronic computers, used at
Bletchley Park for code-breaking during the war, and Tommy Flowers, who led the
team that made them, is remembered by the modern street name, Flowers Close.
14.
The aftermath of the West Hendon bombing, February 1941. (Barnet Local Studies
Centre image 5105)
It was not those
key targets that were hit during the Welsh Harp’s worst bombing raids of the
Second World War. Early in 1941, Germany was testing new designs of
high-explosive bombs, and dropping a single bomb in a raid, so that its effects
could be seen afterwards. One of these exploded above the Ravenstone Road area
of West Hendon on the evening of 13 February 1941, flattening 40 homes, killing
more than 80 people and making around 1,500 homeless. At the opposite end of
the reservoir, a V2 rocket hit one end of Wykeham School in March 1945. Luckily
no children were there at the time, but seven people were killed in nearby
homes.
Just as it had during the First World War, the
reservoir played its part between 1939 and 1945. A Hendon Sea Training Corps
was formed in 1941, and its young volunteers learned some boating skills on the
Welsh Harp, as well as on land at a school in Algernon Road. Production at many
factories was changed, to produce equipment for the war effort. Hickman’s works
on the North Circular Road had been shopfitters, but by 1943 their carpenters
were building wooden landing craft, which were tested on the reservoir before
being handed over to the Royal Navy. LCAs were “Landing Craft, Assault”, which
carried a platoon of up to 36 soldiers, from ships around ten miles offshore,
onto the beaches of Normandy on D-Day.
15. The Hickman's workers aboard a completed
landing craft, 1943/44. (Image shared by the son of a worker)
Next weekend we’ll visit the Welsh Harp in more
peaceful times. I hope you will join me then, for the final part of this
series.
Reports are reaching me of massive increases in water bills as Thames Water takes billing over from Brent Council. Water bills used to be incorporated into rent paid to Brent Council and then passed on to Thames. Now Thames are billing each dwelling for direct payment and some residents are reporting substantial increases.
The information coming is is from is from CAMS, which is Comber Close, Ainsworth Close, Banting Close and Mackenzie House in Dollis Hill.
One tenant said they were now paying £47 a month to Thames having previously paid Brent Council £6 a week as part of their rent. Local activist Alison Hopkins said that a tenant of a 2 bedroomed flat was paying more than she did for her three bedroomed house and garden.
To add insult to injury another tenant hoping to install a water meter to reduce bills was told that one might not be possible to fit as the flats are old:
I’ve just spoken
to [Thames Water], they claim it’s worked out on the chargeable value of my
property (which I don’t understand what that is) and waste water charge.
I asked why has it almost tripled they said if you have a view etc or a
big garden then that’s how it’s worked
out???They said they don’t know if a meter can be fitted here either so
I’m waiting for someone from Thames Water to call me back, Sod’s law
being these blocks are old etc I won’t be able to have one fitted! Then
the only option is to continue with the large payments per month! I’m
still waiting for my new rent charge letter to come out from Brent, I
bet it won’t be any different even without the water charge.
It appears that the problem may be to do with a miscalulation of the chargeable value* of the council properties and tenants have been urged to contact Thames Water to complain and seek a review of their bills. LINK
This is what Thames say about chargeable value:
What is chargeable value?
Bills for unmetered properties, built before
1989, are based on the chargeable value of the property (also known as
the rateable value).
The chargeable value was set by the Valuation Office at the Inland
Revenue and represents the potential annual rent for your property. This
is not related to your council tax banding.
Rateable Values were based on the size, location, access to local
facilities and desirability of your property. For example, if your
property had double glazing and the identical property next door didn’t
your home would have been given a higher rateable value. This charge
isn’t calculated from your actual water use.
We apply this value to calculate your water charges. There is one
rate for water services and another for wastewater services. The rates
you pay depend on where you live. You will also pay a fixed yearly
charge.
You can find out more about your rateable charge in our charges leaflet.
Please let me know if your water bill has suddenly soared.
Less than a month after Alice Lester, Brent Council Head of Planning, sent formal permission for the development at 4-9 Gladstone Parade, the developer has come in with a new application to add an additional storey and an additional 16 units to the proposal. LINK Their knowledge of the local area is a little suspect when they can't spell the name of the road correctly!:
In comparison with the previous scheme,
the proposal introduces an additional storey to the Edgeware Road frontage as well as a
partial additional storey at both the Dollis Hill Avenue and Gladstone Park frontages. The raising
of the height of the building by 712mm is minimal in the context of the overall development and
will barely be perceptible in the wider street scene. The proposal is of a similar, albeit
smaller, height to the Fellows Square development on the opposite side of Edgeware Road and
therefore the increase in height is considered accepting (sic) in terms of the emerging local context.
The increase in the number of units is based on a viability assessment:
The
Development Appraisal, prepared by James R Brown and Company Ltd, assess the
financial viability of the proposed scheme and the residential market in
London.
Since
the viability review of the previous scheme, dated March 2017, the new homes
market in London has increasingly and significantly weakened. Residual land
values are therefore reducing due to weaker new homes values and increased
build costs. Subsequently, the viability of the 38-residential unit scheme is
now substantially challenged (due to the weaker market conditions) and
therefore in order to improve the viability and efficiency of the site a larger
scheme of 54 units its proposed.
The
residential content of the new proposed scheme contains a 34.4% affordable
housing provision by habitable room, detail in paragraph 9.2 of the viability
report. The appraisal demonstrates that the proposed scheme drives a negative
residual deficit and falls marginally short of being viable with 16 affordable
housing units in comparison to the consented scheme which is significantly
unviable with 10 affordable housing units.
The revised proposal is already garnering opposition on social media:
The fascist graffiti that was painted on the railway footbridge bridge linking Kendall Road and Gladstone Park has been painted out ahead of the community 'paint out' that had been planned for 5pm this evening. LINK
As I understand it Network Rail had also undertaken to remove it but a local resident beat them to it.
A clear message to fascist individuals or groups that they are not welcome here.
UPDATE FROM A READER November 14th: A resident had done the initial paint-out and then Network Rail followed overpainitng not just the area of fascist graffiti but all the other graffiti too, in regulation green. Yesterday evening a number of Brent residents and councillors gathered at the bridge in a gesture of solidarity with the people of Dollis Hill.
Graffiti on the railway bridge linking Kendal Road and Gladstone Park
Ariel view of the bridge
Local residents spotted fascist graffiti today on the Kendal Road railway bridge that crosses over into Gladstone Park.
This follows an earlier episode when racist and fascist graffiti was found near Jewish homes in the area. LINK
That graffiti was removed by loacl people in a clean up and similar action will be taken regarding the swastika above. On Tuesday evening at 5pm local people and anti-racist actvists will don rubber gloves and bring paint and brushes to get rid of this unwelcome sign of the presence of fascist sympathisers in our midst. Meet at the bridge.
An organiser of the 'paint out' said:
Our community is
saddened and angered that fascist graffiti has again appeared in our
happy multicultural area. We are going to paint it out in a show of our
strength. We won’t be divided by hate!
These stickers have also appeared in the area:
The NSZ (Narodowe Siły Zbrojne - National Armed Forces) was an anti-Nazi and Anti-Soviet Polish resistance movement often accused of anti-Semitism although that has been challenged as Soviet propaganda. After a split in the organisation in 1944 NSZ-ZJ (the Lizard Union) was formed which appeares to have been a more extremist wing. LINK
The T-shirt says: There are two types: they are either your brothers in faith or your equals in humanity
Standing together in solidarity
Local people, including members of North West London Stand Up To Racism, received a warm welcome tonight at the Al-Majlis and Al- Hussaini Centre in Dollis Hill when they visited to express support and solidarity after the previous night's attack. The Chair and Secretary of Brent Trades Council were amongst the visitors.
The group were invited in to share in the celebrations and the atmosphere was positive with clear determination that such episodes would not be allowed to divide the community.
I was struck particularly by a very articulate lower secondary boy who was keen to explain his faith and at the same time emphasise his respect for all religions by explaining the meaning of the slogan on his T-shirt.
Women visitors were welcomed with food and sweets and speeches were made thanking them for their support.
There was a low-key police presence at the Centre in Edgware Road as well as effective stewarding by the Centre itself.
Earlier Brent Council had issued this statement from Cllr Muhammed Butt, leader of the council:
Our thoughts and prayers are with those who have been injured and
all those affected by the serious act of violence which took place
outside the Al-majlis Al-Hussaini Center last night.
We are in close contact with the police who are looking into this as
a possible hate crime. However, we are reassured that the police do not
believe there is an ongoing threat to Brent's Muslim community. There
is absolutely no place for hate in our borough. Violence like this will
not be tolerated.
We visited representatives at the centre this afternoon and will give them all the help they need.
Brent has one of the most diverse communities in the UK and we are
extremely proud of this. We will not allow cowardly acts like this to
spread fear and hate amongst our residents.
There was a good turn-out at tonight's vigil in Hamilton Road, Dollis Hill, after the discovery of Nazi graffiti at the weekend.
The vigil was addressed by Rabbi Baruch Levin and Muahmmed Butt, leader of Brent Council as well as members of the local community.
The message was clear that we were united against such attempts to divide the community and had learnt from history what happened if such ideas and movements were not opposed.
The hearts on the bus stop and messages on the pavement were reclaiming our streets.
Caroline Russell, Green Assembly Member for London, has written to the London Mayor urging him to reject the planning application for the Rail-Freight facility in Cricklewood.
Her letter is below (click on bottom right square to enlarge)
Further to the question posted in my last
post regarding the Cricklewood dump and the North London Waste Authority’s
original opposition to the resiting: ‘Has anything changed?’ Here is Alison Hopkins’ request to the NWLA
asking why they had changed their position and the (‘totally inadequate’ according
to Alison) response:
I am writing to you as a resident of Brent –
Dollis Hill, to be specific – and the former ward councillor here. I have
also submitted evidence to the Public Inquiry held this week into CPO3. The NLWA submitted a most comprehensive
objection to the CPO orders. Your statement included many of the issues which
we living here have with the proposed Geron Way site, including those related
to traffic, environmental issues and very close proximity to an infants school
and houses.
I am told by the Clerk to the Inquiry that
the NLWA has withdrawn its objection. If this is the case, then this is deeply
disappointing and extremely worrying. Residents here have opposed the resiting
since it was first proposed back in the early 2000s.
Could you please inform us why the NLWA has
withdrawn its objection? The problems with the proposed Geron Way/Selco site
have not gone away, and as a public body, we believe the NLWA has a duty of
care to Brent residents. Moving the current WTF to the proposed site directly
conflicts with that duty and is not in the public interest.
From NLWA:
NWLA and LondonEnergy Ltd have agreed terms
with the London Borough of Barnet for the provision by the London Borough of
Barnet of a new waste transfer station at Geron Way, NW2. Given that the
Authority has now been offered an acceptable replacement, we have withdrawn our
objection to the London Borough of Barnet’s application for a compulsory
purchase order that included the current Hendon transfer station. It is
currently expected that the new waste transfer station will be ready early in
2020.
In her submission to Barnet Council on the proposed waste transfer facility on the Edgware Road LINK, Alison Hopkins mentioned the North London Waste Authority's orginal opposition to the resiting.
Not if local residents
have their way. Six hundred and sixtyone people have signed a petition opposing the loss of the fish
and chip shop on Gladstone Parade, Edgware Road, which they fear would go if the site is redeveloped and other
ojections have been lodged including over-development of the site; loss of
light, amenity and health; low level of affordable housing proposed, parking
and the recurring theme in Brent of lack of consultation.
The planning application
is due to be discussed at Wednesday’s Planning Committee and in a controversial
move Cllr Muhammed Butt is due to visit Gladstone Parade this evening at 6pm.
The move is controversial because the Planning Committee is independent of the
Council by statute and political interference in its deliberations is illegal.
Butt was able to make representations in the Wembley Stadium application on the
basis that he was representing residents in his Tokyngton ward - this is not
the case with this application.
Responding to concerns
over the potential loss of the pub and fish and chip shop Brent planners state:
The pub will be
reprovided as well as two units that could potentially house a shop due to
their use class and a unit will be provided that could provide a replacement
fish and chip shop.
Given that there are likely to be issues of affordability regarding the new units this leaves little
certainty and representations against the application will be
made on Wednesday.
Cllr Liz Dixon,
responding to a resident’s objections wrote:
Thank you for taking the
time to draft and send this comprehensive overview of your objections to the
proposed redevelopment plan of Gladstone Parade.
I can reassure you that
we have been following this development closely. We are acutely aware that many
in the local community are extremely distressed as they anticipate the
consequences of the new development. From my point of view I can see that the
development in Barnet looms over the area and this must heighten the concern.
That said there are some benefits to be had for the community with the new
development apart from new housing ; there is space for the chip shop and the
shop and the pub.
Even limited social
housing in non high rise is attractive in a borough which desperately need more
social housing. As a local councillor most of my case work is focused on those
who are homeless or overcrowded and we often have to send residents out of
London.
We have visited the shops
and visited the planning offices in the council to raise all the objections and
to learn more about the project. They have modified the plans and there are
facilities to accommodate the new shops which will be housed in any new
development. However that may not be enough.
We are due to visit the
shops with the Leader of the Council before the matter goes to planning to
ensure we are all aware of the ongoing concerns of local residents like
yourself. Again thank you very much
for taking the time to highlight local concerns
and issues.
The matter is before planning this week where the concerns will be heard and
considered. I have been at planning meetings before and can vouch for the
rigour of the offices in ensuring that they do take into consideration all the
concerns. This is where the local community does have an opportunity to make their
concerns heard. I agree with you that in light of the horrific tragedy at the
Grenfell towers all councils must ensure they are really listening to their
residents who have knowledge and well placed concerns such as those expressed
in your email.
We will soon hold public exhibitions to present information about the
new Waste Transfer Station and Rail Freight Facility, which forms part
of the Brent Cross Thameslink project.
You will be able to meet the project team and ask any questions you might have.
Email us: BXT@glhearn.com to join our newsletter list and be kept up to date.
Comment by Alison Hopkins on Facebook The viw from Dollis Hill
And this, by the way, is what the exhibition is all about. No
matter how they spin it, Barnet want a dump on our door step. That rail
freight yard is behind Lidl and is ALREADY operating without consent.
Doesn't make you hopeful if Barnet don't listen to their own residents,
let alone those of us in Dollis Hill!
The Kilburn Times reveals today that Brent Council has told them that the developer has withdrawn the pre-planning presentation for the 27 storey tower block in Dollis Hill from Wednesday's Planning Committee agenda. LINK
It will be rescheduled for a later date.
This follows a posting about the plans on Wembley Matters on WednesdayLINK and subsequent comments on The View from Dollis Hill Facebook LINK
The block along witha banqueting hall and swimming pool would replace the historic Admiralty Chart House.
The 'Pre-Application Presentations' now made at Brent Planning Committee are useful as an early warning of planning applications to come. The public are not allowed to make representations but can watch the presentation.
At the November 16th Committee there is a presentation on plans for 403-405 Edgware Road/corner of Oxgate Lane that includes a 23 storey building. The present building has a fascinating history. It was completed on the site of an existing admiralty building, known as the Admiralty Chart House in 1940 and housed navy and civilian staff in case Whitehall became unusable because of bomb damage. Since then it has had multiple uses uncluding a carpet warehouse LINK:
SCHEME:
replacement with mixed use development (including tall building up to 27 storeys),
comprising: • Flexible Class B1/B2/B8 employment space (approx. 1,375 sq. m), predominantly located
on ground floor, with some also on first floor; • Banqueting and conference centre, comprising one large hall, two smaller halls, (located on
the first floor, with ground floor lobby/reception area); • Fitness centre and health spa (including a swimming pool); • Residential accommodation (providing approx. 150 apartments);
• Roof garden and outdoor terrace;
• Dedicated service yard within the building to service the employment floorspace,
accommodate other delivery vehicles and for refuse/waste collection; • Three levels of basement car parking, providing space for approximately 166 spaces,
together with cycle storage.
Ex Dollis Hill Councillor Alison Hopkins has already made her views known on behalf of Dollis Hill residents:
Firstly, there’s obviously the fact that the site is of major historical interest. We’d most certainly push for Listing if there were any attempt made at demolition. The current owners illegally removed the Crittall windows and were served a notice to replace them, too. Other modifications have also been made by them and the building has been deliberately neglected.
The idea of a conference centre to serve over two thousand people is, frankly, insane. The local transport system simply can’t support it and our roads cannot take the volume of parked cars. The owners of the building have already caused massive disruption at times by using the building for festivals and exhibitions. The knock on impact of their inconsiderate parking has been felt within a mile or more radius here in Dollis Hill.
A further point on the conference centre is that it is highly unlikely to be used by local residents, given the salary levels and deprivation levels in Dollis Hill. The functions which the applicant has already held in the building have been attended by people who were most certainly not local. Having talked to several, they came from as far away as Reigate and Brighton!
As you rightly state in the report, it will also cause massive pressure on the businesses who park locally.
I don’t know if you’re also aware that Highways have already stated that a CPZ will be needed across Dollis Hill once the Brent Cross scheme gets going: the funding for that is apparently coming from Barnet’s S106/CIL monies.
In terms of transport, whilst there may possibly be a new Brent Cross Overground station one day, access to it from Brent is very limited for pedestrians, so I’m not convinced it will improve the PTAL rating overmuch. The applicants claim of 30 buses every hour on that stretch of the A5 is, frankly, nonsense.
Additionally, the idea of a 27 storey tower block is unbelievable. It’s totally out of context, intrusive and represents a development that is massively out of place in what’s still a mostly residential area. I note you’ve stated that the surrounding buildings are three of four storey, but the 1920s and 30s two storey housing is not far away. Given the topography of the area, it will be very obvious – just as the 27 storey block in Barnet on the Welsh Harp is LINK.
In terms of traffic, I have VERY grave concerns indeed about the impact on Dollis Hill. It is not currently possible to turn right into Oxgate Lane (or Humber Road) from the southbound A5, and the only access to the site, whether from the A5 or Oxgate Lane is from the northbound Edgware Road. Barnet’s Brent Cross Regeneration plans call for a new road junction at Humber Road, allowing a right turn from the southbound A5, but this is being opposed strongly, and so may not happen. But in any event, as matters stand anyone approaching the development from the southbound A5 would need to rat run through Dollis Hill, by using Oxgate Gardens or Dollis Hill Lane, then Coles Green Road for access. We already face tens of thousands of extra cars each day from the Brent Cross plans, so this would be a major issue.
The detailed pre-planning report can be found HERE.
