Lewisham Carpetright gutted for imminent tower beside station

Work to demolish the former Carpetright store beside Lewisham station is progressing with the building now almost completely gutted.

This was the site back in April:

In its place will be a modular student tower. Developers were hoping to complete by summer 2020 given the rapid speed of new modular construction methods but that now looks unlikely given the existing building has so far taken five months to strip to its shell.

The pics were taken from Lewisham station showing the close proximity of the site.

A new station entrance is planned here – though after being built there’s no confirmation it will actually open.

Part of a new station would serve Lewisham station for Southeastern rail – or whatever it will be called when the building is complete. Given franchise turmoil staffing for the new entrance is an unknown. It may be mothballed.

Another part of the new entrance would serve a future Bakerloo Line station – though there’s still no confirmation it will even go ahead. It’s very likely but still yet to be signed off by central government – which of course is delaying completion and results in TfL avoiding income from new developments to fund the expansion.

The best case scenario is opening in 2029/30 which is pretty pitiful given planned housing and the speed many other nations build.

Some sort of extension has only been on the drawing board since an extension to Camberwell was approved as part of the “London Electric Metropolitan District and Central London Railway Companies (Works) Act 1931”.

Almost 100 years after the act passed we could see it extend beyond Elephant and Castle. But then again maybe not.