Welcome to Glyndon estate
A number of photos have been sent highlighting very poor conditions across Glyndon estate on the borders of Plumstead and Woolwich. Some photos are from last August, and some from this July. Little has changed over the year in terms of repairs and upkeep. Google Streetview shows damage has existed since at least 2008.
Do Greenwich Council employ even one person who can repair walls? They’re broken borough wide on council managed land. Poor conditions like this for over a year show the Housing Department, who are in charge of public space upkeep here, aren’t doing routine audits of their assets.
The Labour councillor in charge of the department is Averil Lekau. Her email is Averil.Lekau@royalgreenwich.gov.uk if you have similar issues near you. She has attended only 75% of meetings across the council.
Greenwich Council have seen severe cuts from the Tory Government but are in a better position than some other authorities. As the area has seen some of the highest homebuilding in the UK the local authority has seen healthy revenue from the New Homes Bonus scheme. More than £40 million since 2011. More than £23 million came in last year alone from the New Homes bonus and Section 106 / Community Infrastructure Levy payments from developers.
Various issues with the Housing Department
The latest Housing Department report show they are missing targets by a wide margin.
- 83.92% of non-urgent repairs (6,011 repairs out of 7,163) were completed on
time against a target of 96% - For urgent repairs it was even worse – just 75% completed on time against a 98% target. See Page 9 here.
- Revenue loss due to empty homes was 1.91% against a 1.1% target.
Greenwich Council have also paid out the tenth highest amount out of any local authority due to problems within houses over the past five years according to the News Shopper. Is it any wonder local residents are creating a political party to contest next years local elections?
The condition of many external areas is asking for litigation from no-win no-fee lawyers. Taxpayers will be on the hook again.
Here’s the inside of a Glyndon Estate building:
I’ve also been these pics from Abbey Wood with similar issues of upkeep. Some fences have been replaced but others remain like this:
It’s not only restricted to the east though. As I’ve previously covered, similar is seen in Greenwich surrounded by various new build developments. After two years of residents contacting Greenwich council to no avail, this six foot high section of wall has finally been replaced.
Yet there’s worrying cracks at the end of the same wall:
And conditions elsewhere weren’t good:
The Greenwich Council Housing Department is not functioning well on a multitude of fronts. These problems with asset management are chronic and date long before central government cuts hit. Hiring maintenance staff, and improving existing practices would help prevent legal claims in future.
If you have similar problems near to you, send photos to fromthemurkydepths@gmail.com
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Standard tactic…. let the estate fall into a complete mess, sell it to a property developer, who tears it down to build expensive apartments…. just like the Ferrier estate!
The thing is pretty much all estates are in poor shape, so unless Greenwich Council are looking to sell them all its probably more like incompetence. And with many it’s at least 10-20 years of neglect and decline, and no sell offs yet.
Not to excuse it, but the reason those areas are in disrepair is because children play in those areas and that results in damage to the brick work.
I never paid any attention to it until I saw it in the blog.
I’m more concerned about the betting shops on Brewery Road, where you’ll find even more disrepair in and around it!
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Greenwich Council do not care about the Glyndon Estate.
They rather want to spend £91,000 on installing/extending a Controlled Parking Zone in the area based on the potential that Plumstead – as an in-between station to Woolwich and Abbey Wood, Crossrail commuters will want to park around the area. Even though there are parking restrictions in place, the council have decided to extend the Zone.
Greenwich Council has no clue and what a waste of bloody money!
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