Revised new - M&S planning application to replace Iceland..

[James Barber]

Hi daveybigpotatoes,

The Coop/somerfield applicatino is a really good analogy. It used to have a customer car park. Then it was given planning permission (before I or my colleagues were elected) to extend over that car park. The residents of Ashbourne Grove experienced such an increase in parking stress that many then proceeded to pave over their front gardens.

The key difference is that Chesterfield Grove don't have that option - it also reduces parking efficiency and exacerbates water run-off.

Hi bonaome,

I was under the impression as many that the developer and M&S had singed a deal. I only became aware they hadn't SDaturday afternoon, further clarified on sunday afternoon that M&S have helped finance things so far but have not signed a lease. They've kept an option they may or may not take up.

Hope that explains the context a little.

[nxjen]

James Barber Wrote:

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>

> It still expects 15% of customers to arrive by

> tube!

> Flats will put all their waste beside 1

> Chesterfield Grove - separate land not owned by

> the developer.

>

If the application has got these points wrong, how can the rest of the data be fully believed.

> But Southwark has extra car parking rules for

> Dulwich requiring 1.5-2 parking spaces per home.

> The flats are being pitched as not needing play

> provision because they will typically be rented to

> two professional couples. So that's two households

> per property.

So before they are rented to a household of two professional couples, does this mean they will be pitched to the buy to let market rather than first time buyers? This kind of prediction is ridiculous, couples do have children or is it anticipated they will be evicted at this stage?

>

> M&S. I don't believe they've signed any contract

> with the developer and hadn't during the last

> planning application cycle. The developer could

> just as easily, for the right price, lease the

> property to any other business. Supporters of an

> M&S at any price will feel pretty daft if a

> Poundland or 99-p shop sign the lease. M&S is the

> aspirational stalking horse to win local and

> officer favour. We must judge the scheme on the

> merits of any potential shop occupying it -

> despite my predilection for M&S choccy biscuits

> and socks.

Exactly, which emphasises how important it is for the planning committee to heed the views of those living in the close vicinity whose lives will be badly affected by the structural and logistics changes rather than be overwhelmed by a brand blindness which may turn out to be a total red herring (as well as a stalking horse!)

[Earl Aelfheah]

James Barber Wrote:

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>....The residents of Ashbourne Grove experienced

> such an increase in parking stress that many then

> proceeded to pave over their front gardens.

Why is this still allowed? Surely there should be planning restrictions put in place to stop people turning their front gardens into parking lots.

[Jeremy]

I don't really understand why people shouldn't turn their front garden into a driveway. As long as they only have one car per household, and appropriate drainage/surfacing is used to reduce runoff.

[LD929]

Can we still email/write in to voice our opinions, or is that process over and now its just up to the town meeting. Are these meetings perfunctory in nature?

[Penguin68]

The problem here is that the dropped curb necessary to allow a car to access the driveway (nice little earner for the council) takes up as much space as a parked car - so unless you can park 2 cars on your property there is no net gain of parking (just the effect of reserving a space just for you - which is, of course, great for you). It actually achieves what all those who clamour for CPZs really want - their own space next to their house.

The point about drainage is a good one - using gravel over membrane, or porous brick (which is laid, unjointed, over sand) is much, much better than concrete, tarmac or paving slabs to achieve hard standing for cars.

In practice, with so many wide cars, and parked up streets, off-street parking does make for wider useable roads (without so many parked cars, plus passing spaces where there are dropped curbs) so for those travelling in many of the side streets around ED cars in front gardens do actually improve things (unless you are looking for somewhere to park!).

[Jeremy]

Penguin68 Wrote:

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> there is no net gain of parking (just the effect of reserving a space

> just for you - which is, of course, great for

> you). It actually achieves what all those who

> clamour for CPZs really want - their own space

> next to their house.

Still don't really see the downside if you're going to park your car on the road anyway (assuming that if others are anything like me, the cars spends 95% of the time parked at your home anyway).

Also another big plus of having your own driveway is that owning an electric car actually becomes realistic.

Anyway... I do have a certain amount of sympathy for nearby residents, but I don't think that "people will build driveways" is a compelling argument. And at least if M&S move in, you'll be able to buy little tubs of flapjacks and chocolate mini-bites at the end of the street to cheer yourselves up.

[James Barber]

Hi LD929,

Yes you can still email in supporting or objecting to the scheme - please email [email protected] but please copy me so I don't miss anything when I speak at the planning committee tomorrow night.

Front gardens of Chesterfield Grove arn't deep enough to take cars. Which means residents can't ameliorate any additional parking stress in this way.

[spider69]

James Barber Wrote:

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> Hi LD929,

> Yes you can still email in supporting or objecting

> to the scheme - please email

> [email protected] but please copy me

> so I don't miss anything when I speak at the

> planning committee tomorrow night.

>

> Front gardens of Chesterfield Grove arn't deep

> enough to take cars. Which means residents can't

> ameliorate any additional parking stress in this

> way.

What side of the fence will you be just out of interest.

[James Barber]

Hi spider69,

I will face to face tmorrow evening and have in writing objected to deliveries via Chesterfield Grove, delivery times (worse than current Iceland), flats accessed via the service yard, several practicalities around using land they don't own, losing car parking spaces and the predicted 40 car parking spaces needed, to a transport survey based on 15% arriving by the non existant underground.

The site looks ripe for redeveloping but I don't think this application is a good enoguh scheme for East Dulwich or any other part of Southwark.

I wasn't trying to sit on the fence, my written objection is included in the officer report, but I am keen to encourage both people for and against this scheme to ensure it gets a fair hearing.

[spider69]

Appreciate your response

[Mustard]

As I said on another thread, the car wash currently uses the car park for their washed and unwashed vehicles, so this will cause further problems.

[Earl Aelfheah]

@ James Barber

- James, I think you may have said before that Waitrose have previously showed some interest in leasing the building as is? Any idea what happened, or why the lease holder wasn't interested? Apologies if this wasn't you, I can't really remember the details now, hence the question.

[James Barber]

Hi rahrahrah,

The site owners want to lease a shop twice the size do the current one. I'm also told that M&S are an interested party in some way.

[healey]

James Barber Wrote:

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> Hi rahrahrah,

> The site owners want to lease a shop twice the

> size do the current one. I'm also told that M&S

> are an interested party in some way.

If I lived on this street the car wash would cause me more concern than occasional deliveries. Really not the best place for such a facility

[first mate]

Healey, again I can only point out that 6 deliveries a day, by 1.7 articulated lorries, on a narrow residential street,can hardly be described as occasional. However, the car wash also causes disruption and is a pain fir resudents close by. The current application plus the car wash could make life very miserable indeed.

[KalamityKel]

The car wash, really, is not so much of a problem and has never been - of course newer residents to the road will disagree. The site is certainly better used now than it was after the small garage closed where needles, rats etc were regular features!

The car wash is constant and at suitable business hours. Lorry deliveries made and proposed to the site in question is an unnecessary disturbance.

Healey, do you grumble each week when the rubbish/recycling collections are made at the noise? This, you know to expect on a certain day and usually guess roughly what time it will happen. Imagine this kind of thing randomly at all hours of the day. Still think it's fair?

[healey]

KalamityKel Wrote:

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> The car wash, really, is not so much of a problem

> and has never been - of course newer residents to

> the road will disagree. The site is certainly

> better used now than it was after the small garage

> closed where needles, rats etc were regular

> features!

> The car wash is constant and at suitable business

> hours. Lorry deliveries made and proposed to the

> site in question is an unnecessary disturbance.

> Healey, do you grumble each week when the

> rubbish/recycling collections are made at the

> noise? This, you know to expect on a certain day

> and usually guess roughly what time it will

> happen. Imagine this kind of thing randomly at

> all hours of the day. Still think it's fair?

The site in question has been used by large food retailers for decades without the sky falling in.

[cl]

For those not aware, planning permission has been granted, with the additional condition of a formal process of review of the delivery arrangements at 6 and 9 months to ensure the rules (timings/conduct etc) adhered to.

A depressing process. Council admitted the case had been dealt with poorly early on, with full implications not considered properly, and the councillors making the decision clearly did not agree with the inspector's previous appeal decision and conclusions, but ultimately they felt they could not go back on them. So Southwark rolled over and M&S and the freeholder got exactly what they wanted. Despite all of the inaccuracies in their studies. Why on earth Southwark could not approve the application but also extract some basic concessions from the applicants (for instance on delivery times) is absolutely beyond me.

[Louisa]

The application has been granted. Very depressing outcome for the people in the immediate vicinity. The additional reviews of delivery times will be helpful but by this time no doubt an established thriving business will be in place and nothing will come of these so called reviews. More should/could have been done by everyone involved to ensure a positive outcome for everyone. No one is a winner now apart from the freeholder and M&S.

Ladies and gentlemen of ED, welcome to your new M&S Simply Food store.

Louisa.

[KalamityKel]

cl Wrote:

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>

> A depressing process. Council admitted the case

> had been dealt with poorly early on, with full

> implications not considered properly, and the

> councillors making the decision clearly did not

> agree with the inspector's previous appeal

> decision and conclusions, but ultimately they felt

> they could not go back on them.

So... the whole thing was admittedly conducted wrongly yet it's acceptable to pass it anyway? Hmmm makes perfect sense don't it. Surely on those grounds alone the whole thing should not have been considered, with the advice the application be re-submitted and a new committee appointed.

I bet this admission won't be mentioned in written decision.

Again, I ask, what is the point of the planning department?

A precedent has now been set so expect all sorts of ridiculous applications to be made and accepted by the council.

[jaih1]

Presumably the councillors made an informed decision on the basis of the facts presented to them and the balance of reasonableness, rather than "rolling over" - had they been persuaded by the counter arguments they would have voted against it; that is what we vote them in to do. If you don't like their decisions, vote them out at the next election and hold them to account for the promised reviews. As for "no-one is a winner except m&s and freeholder" is odd if, as suggested by the delivery debate, a significant number of people will use the store, providing new choice on the high street and draw in people who will doubtless also bring additional custom to existing caf?s, restaurants and other great shops on lordship lane.

[KalamityKel]

jaih1 I don't think you're overly familiar with the entire application in question or indeed the history leading up to now.

Your opinion may be a little different if a) you had all the facts and b) if you were actually affected by the "new" development to the site.

It has absolutely nothing to do with which retailer will be taking over the site as to why residents are so against the application being granted.

[cl]

Thats the problem Jah1 - you are presuming and were not there. As per my original post, the councillors discussed a number of issues with the application, and considered actions such as imposing an amended delivery schedule/plan which would be more in favour of local residents, such as not having deliveries at 7am or 10pm at night, or having early or late deliveries to the front via Lordship Lane - all agreed that this would be possible, reasonable and exactly as other stores such as Co-Op or Sainsdburys on lordship Lane do. However, after discussion and advice from their lawyer they decided that they could not do this as it would go against the Inspectors appeal decision and conclusions (despite the fact they have the right to over-rule or push the case back to him again). The issue was raised about the financial implications for the council if it was pushed back to M&S again and M&S appealed again - apparently they would then be in a position to claim financially against the council.

So actually this was not a case of the councillors not being pursuaded about the objectors case at all. They explicitly recognised that the issue had not been dealt with properly early on and resulted in the position we are in now - essentially an unsatisfactory situation, but felt their hands were tied by the Inspector's conclusions.

So when I saw 'rolling over' what I mean is that the freeholder (with M&S behind them) has got away with an application that was riddled with inaccuracies (15% of customers arriving by tube for example!) for an over-development of a small site with an obvious impact on the local residents, and in the end Southwark has done virtually nothing (other than change the sunday delivery time by one hour) to protect the local residents.

[cl]

Lousia,

The delivery timings themselves will not be under review - it will purely be the degree to which M&S is sticking to the proposed schedule that will be.