June 2010 Archives

Tesco's have started selling flat pack homes from their website. The self-assembly log cabins measure 32ft by 16ft and feature 5 rooms, double glazing, underfloor heating and a decking area. Manufactured from highgrade Scandinavian whitewood, Tesco states it offers buyers the opportunity to serve a number of uses from home offices and gyms to lounging areas and playrooms. The only thing you need is somewhere to put it.

In the manual it states 'No specialist skills are required. Anyone can build the cabin although some tasks may require more than one pair of hands. Construction times will vary depending on your skills and the number of people helping you'.

It also suggests 'prior to purchase check whether planning permission and building regulations approval maybe required'.

Over the past few years I think it's fair to say squatting has become much more prominent, in the press and media it definitely has anyway with a number of high profile cases. There are a number of issues which are probably down to the rise in the number of people squatting, whether it be in parliament square or derelict buildings. These are the three biggest factors I can think of why squatting has increased recently:

• More and more buildings are becoming vacant, either reposed or halted during construction.
• People are looking for cheaper accommodation in these recessionary times as rents continue to rise, pushed up by first time buyers not being able to get on the ladder.
• An increasing number of people are wishing to repeal against 'the system' brought down by the banks and are choosing to squat.

I've written on this blog before here and here about Park Plaza's plans to turn the Foundry in Shoreditch in to one of their Art'otel's. Well, The Evening Standard reports that a group of up to 50 squatters have barricaded themselves inside and are preparing for a stand-off with bailiffs and police to remove them. They have been in there for 2 weeks and were issued with a court order last week telling them to leave. This is the Foundry recently, holding an outdoor cinema. 

I passed another one of my sites yesterday on Mare Street, Hackney, a site which has had permission since 2005 for 18 private units. This is what it looked like yesterday.

As you can see most squatters try to keep a low profile, not these ones however...

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Intrestingly the building used to house reformed female prisoners back in the 19th and early 20th century. The squatters here look fairly settled and with planning permission having been in place for a while, it doesn't look like the developers will be building here any time soon.   

A couple of years ago this is the site which would have greeted you when emerging from Gants Hill underground, the local Odeon cinema.

Today, however, the cinema has gone to be replaced by Images, the new and only very recently completed, 200+ unit development by George Wimpey.

• 36,610 gross sq m
• 310 private residential units
• 148 meters tall
• 98 social residential units
• 43 storeys
• 3 wind turbines

...and now it's complete. This is Brookfield Europe's (or Multiplex as we used to know it) Strata development in the Elephant, a few days ago.

The City Road basin recently opened up allowing access to that part of the Regents Canal for the very first time in its history. Situated in between Angel and Old Street tube stations it will form a new public space around two new large developments, that of 259 City Road and 261 City Road. Funded by the developers of both schemes and the Government Office for London (GoL) it aims to increase use of the basin for the local population. Here it is, just last week, now completed.

As well as this, construction is now well under way on 259 City Road. Rising to 29 storeys with 304 resdiential units, it currently looks like this...

When completed, along with 261 City Road, the schemes will provide two landmark buildings in what is becoming an ever high rise development area.

259 City Road, being developed by Groveworld is on the left, with 261 City Road being joint developed by Fidelity and Pembroke Real Estates, shown on the right of this picture.

There are some development sites that have been inactive for so long, that each time you visit them, you naturally assume they'll be in exactly the same state as they were on the previous visit, but a bit more dilapidated, a bit more rustic. So it's always a bit of a shock when you turn up and works have actually kicked off. Here are two examples, a couple of days ago in the east of the capital:

Firstly, Barratt's Waterside Park, just south of the Albert Dock, split into 3 phases totalling around 750 units. Phase 1 has just started (groundworks) and is set to deliver nearly 50 private and over 100 social units.

This site, bounded to the south by the Thames and to the north by the DLR...

...also has Ballymore's Minoco Wharf (aquired from The Unex Group for £20,000,000 back in 2002 and yet to start) as its neighbour to the west:

Secondly (below), we have Lymington Park. Aided by an HCA cash injection of £4.7 million, construction is well underway on phase 1 of the development, the first 70 units of which will be completed by March 2011 comprising 23 homes for market sale, 17 for social rent and 30 for low cost homeownership (acording to Countryside Properties' website). 

Google yesterday launched its new service to list properties via its Google maps. Hundreds of thousands are said to be listed in the UK with the help of estate agents including Countrywide, Zoopla and Trinity Mirror.

Estate agents want to be careful though, individuals can also upload their own houses and dispense with an estate agent all together, they would however need to set up a website for the purpose so that Google can link to it and send visitors to it.

The new property finder service is simple, whilst in maps click on more, and then properties, hundreds of red dots, indicating properties available will then appear. House hunters can then search by location, price, type and numbers of bedrooms and bathrooms.

With Google, its obviously free too, with them making their money from selling advertising space, you can imagine solicitors, mortgage providers and every other property business wanting to pay a premium to expose their products and services.

Andrew Foster, Google's product manager said "given the importance of location to a home search, we've made it easy for home buyers and renters to see listings that match their criteria on Google Maps even as they pan and zoom the map to different areas,"

"We know that many UK home buyers are already using Google Maps in their house hunting, and by adding property listings to the map we're putting everything together for them in one place."

Interestingly the largest omission of estate agents to partner up with Google is Rightmove, a warning to them; google are out to get you, they probably will... 

I went along to the 'Magnificent Maps' exhibition currently showing at the British Library at the moment the other weekend. This was also a 3 part series on BBC4 a month or so back and  from the same curators. One of the more modern maps on show caught my eye by Stephen Walter; you may have already seen it before. Here it is below, looking a lot just like the outline of London, which it is...

until you zoom in more closely that is, because it looks more like this...

An interactive map can be found here. Have a look and see how the cartographic artist has viewed your neighbourhood. As you can see the one above is of the area around Clapham and Brixton, south London.

The artist Stephen Walter comments on the piece, named 'The Island' by saying it satrises the London-centric view of the English capital and its commuter towns as independent from the rest of the country. The artist, a Londoner with a love of his native city, offers up a huge range of local and personal information in words and symbols. Walter speaks in the dialect of today, focusing on what he deems interesting or mundane.

The exhibition runs until the 19th of September and is free. 

Here's a story about Tesco's, are they ever out of the news? 3% of their value was wiped off yesterday due to the shock announcement that chief executive Sir Terry Leahy will step down next year. Just goes to show how successful his 14 years at the helm of the major supermarket has been.

Regarding regeneration though EGi News ran the story that a report by Demos stated big supermarket chains have a key role to play in regenerating Britain's poorest communities. Andrew Simms however, the author of Tescopoly hit back saying instead, that they "hoover" money out (story)

Whatever side you sit on, Tesco's don't seem to be slowing down. Two weeks ago the London Thames Gateway Development Corporation granted permission to this scheme below, near the Olympic site in Bromley-by-Bow. The permission involves a new Tesco store; roughly double the size of the one on the site currently along with 454 homes, a 104 bed hotel, 2 primary schools, a library and other mixed use spaces.

Another Tesco's site goes to planning tonight, this time Hackney Council will determine the scheme below on Morning Lane; it goes to committee with the recommendation to grant. This one again involves a new improved supermarket as well as 113 residential units "above the shop".

Architects Squire & Partners have just released new images of their Vauxhall Cross plans to stand on the island site fronting both Vauxhall tube station and the St Georges Wharf scheme. A similar application was submitted in 2005 but then withdrawn in late 2007. A new application is now thought be a few months away from being filed with Lambeth Council, this time a slightly slimmed down version but still very much in keeping with the original design.

The development will involve two buildings of 41 and 31 storeys, a decrease from the original proposal of 52 storeys. However it looks like the developer will make this up by increasing the height of the smaller tower, last time it planned to rise to just 25 storeys. Within the project will be 291 residential units and 180 hotel beds as well as public skybar on the 14th storey.

It is being developed by Kylun who purchased the site from London & Regional. Kylun is a development vehicle, with financial backing from the private interests of the Chief Executive of Fal Oil Company. More information on the scheme can be found here:

In the last blog I speculated whether or not the eviction of the eco-warriors from st George's Kew HQ site would herald the start of construction. I was there yesterday and guess what?

Here's a closer look:

Notice the digger in the background? Looks as though site preparation has started.

This image has NOT been Photoshopped:

This is a sinkhole, and apparently they're more common than you may think. Go here for the full story. 

This building below was one of the first casualties of the credit crunch, with the developers of the scheme going bust at the back end of 2007 and the development subsequently grinding to a halt. It had been in the same state as the picture below shows for nearly 3 years, the building mostly topped out, the frame complete and covered in scaffolding, with some cladding also present. The whole scheme was also 'all sold', off plan, something not unfamiliar back in those boom years.

Walking past the site yesterday though, construction has re-started, although the picture isn't too conclusive, believe me, it definietly has. Boards state the scheme is now being built out by Hadley in association with specialist private bank Investec. They also have a new scheme name, instead of Ropewalk, it's now 'Bermondsey Central'. The website can be viewed here:

Don't expect things to complete too quickly here though, the builders had much more important things on their minds with only 8 days left until the world cup starts... a bit of kicky ups!