Barry Gardiner MP joins ward councillors in opposing the loss of Samovar Space and Market Square to hotel development

 

England fans on Market Square ahead of the 2020 Euro Cup Final - July 11th 2021 

(Credit & Copyright Alamy)

 

Barry Gardiner MP (Brent North) has joined Wembley Park ward councillors Cllr Ahamadi Moghaddam and Cllr Najib Warsame in opposing the building of a  hotel on Market Square and Samovar Space, currently in use as a public open space.

Barry Gardiner writes:

   

Planning Team

Brent Council

 

29 July 2026

 

To whom it may concern,

 

Objection to planning application 26/1351 for Plot NW04

 

I write to object to the above-referenced planning application for the erection of a hotel between two and 17 storeys tall on what is currently the Market Square/Samovar Space.

 

You may be aware that I do not normally intervene in planning matters except in exceptional circumstances, including if the planning application is a major infrastructural development. These developments have knock-on effects with wider political ramifications within the local community such as traffic generation, overcrowding of doctors’ surgeries, and inadequate number of spaces in local schools.

 

This application is one such exception. I have been alerted to it by my constituents and I agree with their concerns that these proposals would have severe detrimental impacts on Wembley Park, visitors, and most importantly, residents.

 

At the time of writing, the application has attracted 131 comments on your planning portal. Every single one of them objects. I note from these comments that residents have not been properly notified or consulted by the applicant. I am also aware of a Change.Org petition against the application which has almost 700 signatures to date.

 

Benefit of the Samovar Space

 

The Market Square/Samovar Space is one of the few free, open spaces in Wembley Park that people can spend time in. It hosts markets and community events and is one of the most attractive spaces in an area which is increasingly dominated by high-rise blocks. Samovar provides a free play area for local children, many of whom live in high rise flats that lack outdoor space. The plot is currently a much needed ‘third space’ in which people socialise and form community without having to patronize a business.

 

I understand that the proposals include plans for a new square. This does not afford the same community benefit as the existing space. It would likely suffer from wind tunnelling, and would effectively be the courtyard of commercial premises rather than a genuine public space. The space would also be completely lost with no alternative provision during multiple years of construction.

 

Supposed benefit of the development

 

There is already a plethora of hotels in the immediate vicinity. In Wembley Park we have two Premier Inns, a Holiday Inn, Best Western, Novotel, Hilton Hotel, Wembley International, St George’s Hotel, ARK Wembley, CityLiveIn, and the Ibis which is being refurbished. There are also a number of smaller establishments and further options in neighbouring wards.

 

A new hotel is of very little benefit to the residents who live here and does nothing to diversify the area. Residents actually benefit from community services such as the social and leisure space that already exists on the plot.

 

This is already an intensely developed area. Regeneration projects, commercial services, and the custom and footfall they create need to be balanced across Wembley and Brent, rather than further concentrated in Wembley Park.

 

Harms of the development

 

While the benefits of the proposals are extremely limited, this development would cause a range of active harms to the area, residents and visitors. On top of the loss of the community space, these harms include:

 

·     Years’ long construction causing noise and physical disruption as well as dust and debris;

 

·      Reduced sightlines and sunlight due to the huge scale of the proposed building;

 

·      Exacerbation of the Olympic Way wind-tunnel and echo effects;

 

·      Traffic from construction, hotel guests and ongoing servicing will exacerbate road congestion;

 

·      Trees are unlikely to survive relocation or, if retained, to survive the nearby construction;

 

·      Reduced attractiveness and vibrancy of the area.

 

Many of the consultation’s respondents have quite rightly raised critical safety concerns about the development.

 

Baroness Casey’s review into the disorder in and around Wembley Stadium during the Euro 2020 Final concludes that there was a series of ‘near misses’ in which serious injuries or fatalities were only narrowly avoided. She highlights issues with crowd control specifically on Olympic Way and Engineers Way, and notes that ‘excess crowds overloaded in confined spaces’ were ‘deemed to be one of the highest risk scenarios’ that day.

 

The existing plot provides much needed open space for event day crowds to gather and dissipate, as well as potential space for evacuation of the high volume of visitors we often welcome to Wembley Park. The proposals would remove the Wembley Splay route, which eases pedestrian congestion. Without this, event day crowds will be even further concentrated.

 

The Casey Review quotes a FA/Wembley official: ‘the outer perimeter [of Wembley Stadium] is hard to manage because of the residential blocks’. Constructing a further block so close to the Stadium and Arena can only exacerbate this concern.

 

Planning compliance

 

I understand that outline permission for this development was granted in 2011 under decision 10/3032. Since then, the Market Square and Samovar Space has become a well- established community facility, and Wembley Park has seen the proliferation of similar high-rise blocks. The Planning Committee must consider the site’s current use and setting rather than rely on 15 year-old proposals and assessments.

 

 

I understand that in 2018, Brent Council contributed £12.1 million to improve the site on the condition that the developer would not pursue the full outline parameters. However, I understand that this proposal of a 17 storey building does reach the full parameters. The planning committee must consider whether the approving this application would default on this agreement involving public funds.

 

The outline permission was granted ahead of various new policies such as the National Planning Policy Framework 2012, the Brent Local Plan 2019 – 2041 and the London Plan 2021. Application 26/1351 must be assessed against current requirements. Particular attention should be paid to the following:

 

The National Policy Planning Framework 2012

 

Section 8: Promoting Healthy and Safe Communities

 

102. Planning policies and decisions should promote public safety and take into account wider security and defence requirements by:

 

a. anticipating and addressing possible malicious threats and other hazards (whether natural or man-made), especially in locations where large numbers of people are expected to congregate…

 

103. Access to a network of high quality open spaces and opportunities for sport and physical activity is important for the health and well-being of communities,

104. Existing open space, sports and recreational buildings and land, including playing fields and formal play spaces, should not be built on unless:

 

a. an assessment has been undertaken which has clearly shown the open space, buildings or land to be surplus to requirements; or

 

b. the loss resulting from the proposed development would be replaced by equivalent or better provision in terms of quantity and quality in a suitable location; or

 

c. the development is for alternative sports and recreational provision, the benefits of which clearly outweigh the loss of the current or former use.

 

105. Planning policies and decisions should protect and enhance public rights of way and access including taking opportunities to provide better facilities for users, for example by adding links to existing rights of way networks including National Trails.

 

Brent Local Plan 2019 – 2041

 

Policy DMP1: Development Management General Policy

 

Development will be acceptable provided it is:

 

a. of a location, use, concentration, siting, layout, scale, type, density, materials, detailing and design that provides high levels of internal and external amenity and complements the locality;

b. satisfactory in terms of means of access for all, parking, manoeuvring, servicing and does not have an adverse impact on the movement network;

i. resulting in no loss of, and where possible enhancing, community facilities or other land/buildings for which there is an identified need.

 

Policy BD1: Leading the Way in Good Urban Design

 

6.1.12 The policy seeks to create buildings and places of high quality that will be appreciated by future generations. High quality design is both visually interesting and attractive and should enhance local character. Good design is not just about what things look like, it is also about how places function and how individual buildings and the spaces around them contribute to the public realm and community well-being... Good design makes places that put people first, promote health and are welcoming, feel safe, are enjoyable and easy to use for everyone.

 

London Plan 2021

 

Policy G4 Open space

 

B. Development proposals should:

1. Not result in the loss of protected open space

 

Policy S4: Play and informal recreation

 

B. Development proposals should:

1. Increase opportunities for play and informal recreation and enable children and young people to be independently mobile

5. Not result in the net loss of play provision, unless it can be demonstrated that there is no ongoing or future demand.

 

Policy S5 Sports and recreation facilities

 

C. Existing sports and recreational land (including playing fields) and facilities for sports and recreation should be retained unless:

1. An assessment has been undertaken which clearly shows the sports and recreational land or facilities to be surplus to requirements…

2. The loss resulting from the proposed development would be replaced by equivalent or better provision in terms of quantity and quality in a suitable location; or

3. The development is for alternative sports and recreational provision, the benefits of which clearly outweigh the loss of the current or former use.

 

Concluding remarks

 

It is my view that this application offers very little benefit to residents and in fact risks damaging the community, whereas the existing use of the plot as the Market Square/Samovar Space has visible and proven benefits.

Permission should not be granted without wider consultation of residents. I  support my constituents’ calls for the application to be heard at the Planning Committee with public speaking rights for local residents, and for a public explanation of how the developer has met the conditions to benefit from £12.1 million of public funds in submitting this application.

 

Nor should permission be granted prior to the publication of independent reviews on matters including wind, daylight, trees and construction impact as well as assessments from the Metropolitan Police, Wembley Stadium/the FA, the Safety Advisory Group, and any other relevant authorities.

 

I would be grateful if you could please register my objection and ultimately reject this application.

 

Yours faithfully,

Barry Gardiner

Member of Parliament for Brent West

 

To make your own comment follow this LINK Ref 26/1351 

BREAKING: Quintain defy local opposition and submit planning application for a 17 storey hotel between Brent Civic Centre and Olympic Way

 

The new hotel and surrounding area

Quintain's plans to activate 2018 planning permission to build a new hotel on the open space outside Brent Civic Centre, currently occupied by Market Square and the Samovar Space, met with stiff opposition last year, not least from current residents of the Quintain estate. They and visitors to the LDO, Arena and Wembley Stadium had got used to using the space, making it a social meeting place amidst all the tower blocks.

This afternoon Quintain released the statement below:

Quintain Submits Detailed Plans for New Development at Wembley Park

Quintain, the developer and asset manager behind Wembley Park, has submitted a reserved matters planning application to Brent Council for Plot NW04, a key site within the developer’s continuing transformation of the 85-acre estate.

Plot NW04 forms part of Quintain’s wider Wembley Park transformation, which has evolved over the past two decades into a vibrant mixed-use neighbourhood comprising homes, jobs, cultural destinations, and high-quality public spaces.

The site already benefits from outline planning permission granted in 2018 by Brent Council as part of Wembley Park’s ‘North West Lands’ masterplan. That consent established the key development principles, including the scale, height, uses and the requirement to deliver public realm, including a new Civic Square. The newly submitted application seeks approval for the detailed design of the building and surrounding public spaces within these approved parameters.

The proposals include a building ranging from two to 17 storeys, providing a 358-bed hotel alongside ground floor shops and restaurants. A central feature of the plans is the creation of a new permanent civic square, which is larger than proposed under the outline permission and designed to host markets, community events and celebrations throughout the year.

This new public square will replace the temporary “meanwhile” uses previously delivered by Quintain at Market Square and Samovar Space and will complement other nearby public areas including Arena Square, Elvin Gardens and Union Park.

Quintain has undertaken a programme of community consultation to help shape the proposals. This has included engagement with local residents, an online public consultation, and dedicated sessions with the Brent Disability Forum. Feedback gathered has informed both the building design and the public realm.

A planning decision is expected towards the end of the year.  If permission is granted, Quintain will continue discussions with potential hotel operators during 2027.

Quintain will continue to work closely with Brent Council and local stakeholders as the application progresses.

For more information about the proposals, visit: Quintain's public consultation web page or contact development@wembleypark.com.

 

 

www.quintain.co.uk

 

11 Exhibition Way
Wembley
HA9 0FA

 From the Planning Application documents (Reference number 26/1351)  LINK

Olympic Way appears more closed in

Current view of Market Square and Samovar Space play area

 

 

Proposed hotel and Civic Square

Proposed Stopping-up Order near Olympic Steps – the outcome of Brent’s application to the Court on 16 April

 Guest post by Philip Grant in a personal capacity

 

Willesden Magistrates’ Court. (Image from the Courts Service website)

 

At the end of my previous guest post about Brent’s application to stop-up two areas of highway, just to the south of Engineers Way near the Olympic Steps, I said that I would see the Council in Court on Thursday 16 April – and I did! Brent was represented by a barrister from Landmark Chambers, supported by the Council’s top Transport Officer and a Senior Engineer, and by Quintain’s Head of Planning (it was Quintain who had asked Brent to apply for the Section 116 Highways Act 1980 Order). I was represented by – me!

 

I arrived early for the 2pm hearing, and had an amiable discussion with the Brent team and their barrister, who had sent me, late that morning, a four page “Applicant’s submission” document and a fifteen-page copy of a decided Highways Act court case (R. v Leeds City Council, ex parte Spice) which they would be quoting from in support of the application. I don’t know whether they thought this would intimidate me, but I assured them that I had plenty of experience in dealing with Statute and Case Law from my working life.

Heading from the front page of the “Spice” High Court Judgment document.

 

The Magistrate hearing the cases listed for Court 4 did not appear until around 2.30pm, but it was not because he was having a long lunch. It turned out that he had also only received the latest documents from Brent Council that morning! When we got to “our” Case 6, around 3pm, he asked me whether, in the circumstances, I would like an adjournment, so that I could consider these extra documents, and a one centimetre thick “Application Statement” (“AS”) which Brent had submitted to the Court on 7 April. I was only passed a copy of this by the barrister at the start of the hearing. I thanked him for the offer, but said that I was happy to proceed, as it was in everyone’s interests for the matter to be resolved without further delay.

 

Brent Council’s “Application Statement” document.

 

The barrister presented Brent’s application, setting out that the Council had complied with all of the procedural requirements for giving notice, and stating that the Section 116 Order was needed so that responsibility for maintaining the old areas of unnecessary highway could pass to Quintain, who had since developed the land. She referred to photographs in the AS showing the locations of the highway, including those for the eastern hatched area pictured here:

 

The “eastern area” photos from Brent’s Application Statement.

 

The barrister’s presentation went on for around twenty minutes, and then the Magistrate asked several questions. One was about the assurance which Quintain had entered into with Brent, which was claimed to reinforce the Section 106 planning condition which allowed public access to the land which was the subject of the application. He was particularly concerned with the wording in the final sentence of Quintain’s letter of 30 March 2023, a copy of which was at tab 11 in Brent’s AS. That sentence said:

 

‘Although the land will be stopped up, Quintain can confirm that it will remain open to the public and remain free for people to pass and repass over but for the avoidance of doubt there is no intention by Quintain to re-dedicate the land as highway and public access would be on a permissive basis only.’

 

Quintain’s 30 March 2023 letter (with personal names deleted for privacy).

 

The Magistrate felt that ‘on a permissive basis only’ suggested that the public would only have a “licence” to cross the land, not a firm legal right. Quintain’s Head of Planning said that was not what they intended – the company simply wished to ensure that parts of the public space could be closed off for maintenance on the occasional day when this might be necessary. There was a short break while a revised final sentence was drafted, which satisfied the Magistrate’s concerns.

 

I was then invited to present my case objecting to the application. I asked whether the Magistrate had a copy of the photographs evidence document, which I had sent to the Council in January, and had emailed a copy to the Court Office the previous week. He looked in his online case file and said that he had a copy, which he felt would be very useful. I then set out my arguments, that the application was wrong in law. 

 

Extract from the application Plan, showing the hatched areas.

 

Although I agreed with the Council that it was sensible to resolve the residual problem of who was responsible for maintaining the hatched areas of land, they did not need a Section 116 Order to do that. The proposed Order dealt with the land as it is now, and it was necessary for the public to continue to have ‘a right to pass and repass, either on foot or dependent on suitability in a vehicle’ over this land. The draft Order sought the Magistrate’s authorisation to stop-up this highway ‘for the purpose of all traffic and all public rights of way [to be] extinguished.’ But he could only sign the Order if the area of highway was unnecessary.

 

Two ‘key principles’ from Brent’s “Applicant’s Submission” to the Court.

 

I took the Magistrate through the photos I’d taken in January, one by one, and referring to the “Applicable Test” section of Brent’s submission, asked whether highway, such as Olympic Way East, was ‘unnecessary for the sort of purpose for which Justices would reasonably expect the public to use that particular way’?

 

One of my evidence photographs, showing a car crossing the hatched area into Olympic Way East.

 

I also made the point that if the Magistrate did sign the Order which Brent had prepared, it would create two completely contradictory situations for the hatched areas. Under the planning condition and the Quintain letter of assurance the public had the right to cross that land. Under the proposed Order the public’s legal right to cross those small areas of land would be extinguished. Although the public would see no practical change in their use of the land for now, it could create a legal nightmare in future. Public use of the hatched highway areas was necessary, and it was the Section 116 Order which was unnecessary.

 

The Magistrate asked me whether I was aware of Section 142 of the Road Traffic Regulation Act 1984. I admitted that I had not read or considered it. He said that it was possible for a road not to be a “highway”, and from looking at my photos it appeared to him that Olympic Way East was not a highway, but a ‘road to which the public has access’. Similarly, the footway areas, such as that in front of the Olympic Steps, were not highway, but public space to which people had access.

 

The Magistrate said that he would retire to consider his decision, but would come back and give it verbally when he had done so. We waited in Court 4 for at least half an hour until we rose as he returned at around 4.30pm. In summary, he agreed with Brent that the legal status of highway was not necessary for the two hatched areas, so he would sign a copy of the Plan. However, he commended me for my public spiritedness in standing up for the legal right of the public to cross and recross those areas, and said that he would not sign the Order authorising the stopping-up of those unnecessary areas until its wording had been changed, to remove the reference to extinguishing all public rights of way.

 

Both sides left the Court satisfied with the outcome, and Council Officers emailed me a revised draft of the Order the following morning, inviting my comments or agreement. I recommended tidying up the wording over ‘highway maintainable at the public expense’, and suggested that to avoid any confusion over the previous and present uses of the hatched areas they should be described as ‘disused’ and ‘now being part of .…’ I’m pleased to say that my suggestions were accepted, and you can see the difference between the original and final versions of the Magistrate’s Order here:

 

Opening paragraph of the Section 116 Order document.

Closing section of the Section 116 Order document.

 

If the Notice last December about Brent’s application for a Stopping-up Order had included the final wording, I would not have objected to it. So much time and effort, over the past few months, for myself and Council Officers, could have been avoided. I think this underlines the point I made in my March 2026 guest post, that if Brent had (as it used to) a General Purposes Committee consisting mainly of experienced back-bench councillors, who could take the time to question Officers and get things right, rather than Cabinet members rushing through an agenda at 9.30am ahead of a 10am Cabinet meeting, the Council could avoid making some of its bad decisions.

 

There have been too many bad decisions made by Brent Council over the past decade or more, some of them wasting millions of pounds. I hope that the elections on 7 May will see a change in the balance of power, and bring in a majority of councillors willing to work together, across party lines where necessary, to improve scrutiny and decision-making. Scrutiny at Brent Council has been ineffective for too long, mainly because too much power has been in the hands of the same Leader. 

 

 

I have done what I can, on a variety of issues, to try to hold Brent Council to account, including as an honorary member of Martin’s unofficial “Committee” for around a dozen years, but it is time for official and effective scrutiny to pass back to elected councillors, where it belongs. I hope that readers will consider that when they decide who to vote for in May’s local elections.

Philip Grant.

Wembley Park Green Party Councillor backs locals in opposing the building of a hotel on the Market Square-Samovar Public Space close to Wembley Stadium

 The petition LINK against building on the Savovar-Market Square Open Space currently has 314 signatures

 Quintain's Proposed hotel

   

Brent Green Party councillor Iman Ahmadi Moghaddam has come out strongly in support of Wembley Park residents who are campaigning for the retention of the Samovar Space and Market Square in the heart of the Wembley Park Quintain development.

  

He said:

 

I join with Wembley Park residents in opposing the building of a hotel on the site of the Samovar Space and Market Square beside the Brent Civic Centre and in front of the Wembley Stadium steps.

 

The space has become an integral part of Wembley Park. Residents, visitors, shoppers, concert goers and sports fans have all made it their own and it has become an organic part of the Wembley Park experience.

 

As densification of the area becomes more intense it is important to keep a breathing space at its centre, it is as important for safety during events as it is for leisure, entertainment, and its markets,

 

I believe the original reasons that Brent Council gave in 2020 for reaching a deal with Quintain on maintaining a public space on NW04 are stronger than ever. Quintain and Wembley Stadium got the stadium steps out of the deal and the steps of course remain – so should the Samovar Space and the Market Square.

 

Too often, residents are left with the impression that decisions have already been made, which is deeply frustrating. Both the council and developers must do far more to listen to residents, engage transparently, and treat public space as something to be protected, not traded away.

 

UPDATED: Proposed Stopping-up Order near Olympic Steps - Does Brent Council really want to embarrass itself in Court?

Guest Post by Philip Grant in a personal capacity

 

The meeting where submission of the Stopping-up Order application was approved.
(Note the date!)

 

UPDATE: Brent Council have put off the Court hearing for their Stopping-up Order application, but the main Officer involved still seems determined to go ahead with it. He wrote on 15 January:

'The current position is that we have asked Willesden Magistrates Court to vacate the date next Thursday. We had originally only booked a one hour slot at 2pm, but in light of your objections, it was considered that more time would be likely to be needed for the magistrates to consider the matters at hand. Once we have been provided with a new date for the Magistrates’ Court, we will reissue the S116 Stopping Up Notice ....'

The full text of the email, and my response to it, are available in the comments section below ("For Information 3, and 4") for anyone who wishes to read them.

 

In a guest post on 1 January I asked: Why does Brent want to Stop-up “highway” near the Olympic Steps? I have had a couple of email exchanges with Council Officers about this matter since then, the full texts of which are included as “FOR INFORMATION” comments under that article (along with several comments from WM readers).

 

In the latest response, from a mid-ranking Council Officer on 8 January, it was suggested that if I had wanted to challenge the application for Brent’s proposed Stopping-up Order, I should have sought a Judicial Review of a decision made by Brent’s General Purposes Committee nearly four years ago! That was nonsense – any member of the public has the right to be heard when the application is actually made to the Magistrates’ Court.

 

The hearing is scheduled for 2pm on Thursday 22 January. But as I’m convinced that even making the application is a mistake, and unnecessary (and I can be very persistent when I feel strongly about something), I have tried one final attempt to make Brent Council see sense. As I had failed to convince them with words, I decided to use pictures as well. This is the text of the email that I sent on the morning of Monday 12 January to Brent’s Public Realm Director, Chief Executive and Director of Law (and I have asked Martin to include the “pictures” attachment below this post):

This is an Open Email

 

Dear Mr Whyte, Ms Wright and Ms Henry,

 

I have tried, in my emails of 2 and 8 January, to persuade Council Officers in words why Brent Council need not, and should not, pursue this Section 116 Highways Act Stopping-up Order application. 

 

I realise that it must be frustrating when an ordinary resident seeks to tell Officers that they are "going down the wrong road", but when I can see that the present course is wrong, and that there is a right way, I feel I have a civic duty to draw this to your attention. 

 

If my words cannot persuade you, I hope that my pictures will, so please look at the attached document. It shows that the areas of highway, which the proposed Order seeks to remove the legal right for pedestrians and vehicles to cross over, are in everyday use by the people of our borough and visitors to it.

 

Does Brent Council really want to embarrass itself in Court, by claiming that these areas of highway are unnecessary?

 

I realise that Brent Council, and Quintain Limited, wish to resolve an outstanding problem over these areas of land as "adopted public highway", and Highways Act 1980 does provide the right way to do that. It is Section 256, not Section 116:

 

 

 

[From Highways Act 1980 on www.legislation.gov.uk ]

 

 

I sincerely hope that reason and good sense can now prevail, and that the Council will withdraw its Stopping-up application from the Willesden Magistrates' Court list for Thursday 22 January. I look forward to receiving your reply, in good time before that date. Best wishes,

 

Philip Grant.