Agenda item
De Paul House, 628-634 Commercial Road, London, E14 7HS
Minutes:
An update report was tabled.
Paul Buckenham (Development Manager) informed the Committee that the proposed development sort to replace an existing 52-bedroom hostel with a 109-bedroom mix of hostel and housing in multiple occupation (HMO). Out of the total number of the proposed rooms, 25 would be associated with the hostel use situated on the lower ground and ground floor levels. Additionally, 84 rooms it was noted are proposed to be provided for a long-term residential accommodation in the form of housing with shared facilities. This would consist of residents having exclusive use of their ensuite bedrooms whilst sharing communal facilities that include living, kitchen, dining and amenity spaces. In addition, some of the bedrooms on the fifth and sixth floors would have private balconies.
Ms Aleksandra Milentijevic advised the Committee that the existing hostel has the capacity to accommodate 263 occupants in a number of 2 and 3 bedrooms and multi-bed dormitories. Whilst the applicant is proposing a total number of 185 occupants in the currently proposed scheme to be apportioned as follows: 41 in hostel rooms and 144 in the shared living accommodation. It was noted that officers have identified a number of issues associated with the proposed land use. Which included (i) the lack of justification for the need of the HMO use; (ii) its unaffordability; and lack of effective management arrangements. In addition, the proposal fails to provide appropriate affordable housing contributions as required by planning policy.
Notwithstanding that the proposed HMO use is not supported in principle, Ms Milentijevic stated that the:
· Quality of the proposed HMO accommodation is not considered to be acceptable given the proposal’s failure to provide sufficient communal amenity space for the future residents and adequately lit communal indoor amenity spaces.
· Existing building is predominantly three storeys along Commercial Road with a staircase enclosure on the north-eastern corner which reaches four storeys. At the rear, the building steps down to two and one storey with a concrete boundary wall. The existing building has limited value in terms of its external appearance and its replacement with an appropriately designed building is acceptable in principle.
· Proposed building would be seven storeys in height with the two top floors set back on all sides. The scale, height and massing of the proposed development are considered to be excessive and the top floors would be characterised by a poor fenestration pattern. As such, the proposed building would have a harmful impact on the character and appearance of the St Anne’s Church conservation area, in which the application site also lies. Further, the applicant has not submitted an archaeology assessment as required by planning policy.
· Proposal would further fail to provide an adequate amount of cycle parking linked to the HMO use. In addition, the proposed cycle storage would comprise of a shared space within a general storage area which lacks a clear and obvious purpose. This is considered unacceptable in principle due to the safety concerns and likely obstructions.
· Although on-street servicing has been previously agreed and as such is considered acceptable in principle, the proposal has not provided an adequate delivery and servicing strategy that would ensure that adverse impact on the transport network would be mitigated. The applicant has also not provided enough information to satisfy the policy requirement that the proposed development would incorporate enough waste storage capacity to cater for the future occupiers, there are also concerns about the placement of the disabled car parking space. The refuse would be collected via an on-street platform lift, however, the proposal failed to provide adequate details to ensure that the waste management and collection can be successfully achieved; and
· Application site is in an area of a particularly low air quality. The applicant has failed to submit an air quality assessment to demonstrate that the proposal would achieve the air quality neutral standard and has also not submitted enough information to satisfy the relevant requirements contained in the energy and sustainable policies.
Therefore, it is considered that the proposed development does not constitute sustainable development as required by the NPPF. It would fail to comply with the relevant policies in terms of land use, quality of the proposed accommodation, design and heritage, highways, waste, and environmental matters. Accordingly, the proposal would fail to secure the relevant financial and non-financial contributions. Therefore, the officers recommend the proposed development be refused planning permission.
The Chair invited the registered speakers to address the Committee.
Fidelma Boyd Chair of the Parish Council of the RC Church addressed the meeting the main points that she raised maybe summarised as follows:
- The new proposals, albeit amended in terms of upper elevation and re-location of the entrance, still does not represent an appropriate development in the conservation area.
- This application would not adhere to the Council policy 'to achieve high-quality design and protection of amenity within the borough' and in particular the following points within the policy: 'provide layouts that are safe, secure and take account of crime prevention and are developed in accordance with Secured by Design principles' and 'ensure appropriate provision of outdoor amenity space, whether public, private or communal which accords with appropriate minimum standards and is compatible with the character of surrounding areas'.
- The current building on the site raises some serious safeguarding concerns, both for the school/college students who frequently stay there and those long-term residents who are clearly in need of support. It is hard to envisage that the proposed substantial enlargement of the building would not be accompanied by an increase in safeguarding concerns.
Councillor James King; Tom Walker (Local Resident); and Lucinda Longwill (Local Resident) then addressed the meeting the main points are outlined below:
· The cumulative effect of other construction works in the area.
· Lack of affordable housing provision.
· Impact on social cohesion from the increased transient population.
· Concerns over the continued provision for the most vulnerable people.
· No clear management for the proposed development.
· Harm to the character and appearance of the St Anne’s Church conservation area, Lowell Street conservation area, and Our Lady Immaculate Church.
· Impact on the amenity of the surrounding residential properties, loss of daylight and sunlight, loss of privacy, outlook and view; dust, pollution and traffic impacts during the construction stage.
· Impact on the capacity and safety of the surrounding transport network including the DLR, on-streetcar parking, pick-ups/drop offs, servicing and deliveries.
· Environmental impact including the creation of a wind tunnel, increase in noise and air pollution.
Duncan Parr, Planning Partner, Rapleys LLP addressed the meeting as the Applicants Representative his comments are summarised below:
The development would:
· Provide accommodation for tourists on a moderate budget;
· Offer short-term co-living spaces for people on shorter contracts and medium-term tourists not being able to rent a flat in the area;
· Have good accessibility to transport;
· See a decrease in the number of occupants due to the increase in height; and
· Have a positive impact on the street scene with the provision of a ground floor café.
On a vote of 4 in favour the Committee RESOLVED:
That subject to any direction by the Mayor of London, planning permission is REFUSED for the following reasons:
1) The proposed development fails to demonstrate the need for the proposed large-scale HMO use on the site. In addition, the proposal fails to provide affordable housing contributions. As a result, the proposal is contrary to Local Plan policies D.H2, D.H7 of the Tower Hamlets Local Plan 2031 (2020).
2) The scale, height and massing of the proposed seven storey building would be overbearing to the local character of the area and as such would cause harm to the St Anne’s Conservation Area. The site layout and scale of the proposed development fails to follow good design principles indicating the over-development of the site. The proposal fails to secure high quality design detailing. Also, the applicant has not submitted an archaeological assessment as required. As such, the proposal would be contrary to Chapters 12 and 16 of the National Planning Policy Framework (2019), London Plan (2016) policy 7.4 and 7.8 and Local Plan policies S.DH1, D.DH2 and S.DH3 of the Tower Hamlets Local Plan 2031 (2020) and the St Anne’s Church Conservation Area Character Appraisal and Management Guidelines (2009).
3) The proposed HMO accommodation would not provide adequately lit communal indoor amenity spaces. There would also be a lack of communal amenity space for future occupiers of the proposed HMO accommodation. As such, the quality of the proposed shared living accommodation is not considered to be acceptable and in accordance with Chapter 12 of the National Planning Policy Framework (2019), policy 3.5 of the London Plan (2016) and S.H1, D.H2, D.H3, D.H7 and D.DH8 of the Tower Hamlets Local Plan 2031 (2020).
4) The proposal fails to ensure that the operational needs of the proposed development would not adversely impact the safety and capacity of the transport network. Insufficient information has been provided to ensure that the proposed wheelchair car parking space would not impact the safety of the transport network along Island Row. In addition, insufficient Trip Generation data has been provided and an adequate Servicing and Delivery Plan has not been provided. This is contrary to Chapter 9 of the National Planning Policy Framework (2019), London Plan (2016) policies 6.3, 6.9, 6.12 and 6.13 of the London Plan (2016) and Local Plan policies S.TR1, D.TR2, D.TR3 and D.TR4 of the Tower Hamlets Local Plan 2031 (2020).
5) The proposal has not provided a sufficient amount of cycle storage, and the storage that is provided would not meet policy requirements due to its location and accessibility, which contradicts Chapter 9 of the National Planning Policy Framework (2019), London Plan (2016) policies 6.9 and 6.13 and Local Plan policy D.TR3 of the Tower Hamlets Local Plan 2031 (2020). The proposal also fails to demonstrate that enough waste storage capacity, management and collection would be provided to satisfy the requirements of policy D.MW3 of the Tower Hamlets Local Plan 2031 (2020).
6) In the absence of sufficient information, including an air quality assessment and energy assessment based on the GLA’s Energy Assessment guidance and recommendations for the use of SAP10 carbon factors, the proposed development would not be in accordance with Chapters 14 and 15 of the National Planning Policy Framework (2019), London Plan (2016) policies 5.2 and 7.14, and Local Plan policies D.ES1 and D.ES7 of the Tower Hamlets Local Plan 2031 (2020).
7) In the absence of the s106 agreement to provide the relevant financial and non-financial contributions to mitigate the impacts of the development, the proposal fails to comply with policy D.SG5 of the Tower Hamlets Local Plan 2031 (2020).
Supporting documents:
- PA_19_00804_Panda House _04.03.2020_De Paul House, 628-634 Commercial Road, London, E14 7HS, item 5.3 PDF 2 MB
- Update report 5.3, item 5.3 PDF 260 KB