Greenwich Peninsula: New blocks of flats head closer to major roads

It almost a year to the day that I captured progress with new blocks under construction at Greenwich Millennium Village.

Returning a year on to take some snaps shows blocks topped out as new flats edge ever closer towards Ikea and away from the river.

New blocks are a stones throw from Ikea’s garden. As can be seen, this is still a very vehicle-centric area despite a couple of crossing put in as part of Ikea giving £1.7 million to Greenwich Council.

The crossing on the left took an age to turn green. Well actually, after 30 seconds waiting me and others jogged over the road between traffic as there was no sign of it changing. Even after turning around to take a pic it hadn’t changed.

And no effort has gone into creating an attractive environment for pedestrians.  Pleasant it ain’t.

Apologies for a brief divergence towards Ikea now. Alongside money for new crossings in the vicinity of Ikea came cycle stands. They were again entirely empty. Being tucked away from the main store entrance away from most footfall is hardly going to induce people to use them.

A cycle lane was also removed in this area.

In addition, sustainable transport schemes introduced upon opening in February have already been withdrawn.

Back to the village

Despite the Millennium Village name, it’s unclear what Millennium work will complete across the site. More than twenty years after the first home was built and huge swaths of the site still lie undeveloped.

To be fair progress has picked up in the past two years but with house prices falling and the numbers of home being built dropping in the capital again, that could all come to a halt. Again.

The developer of the site, Taylor Wimpey made an average profit across the UK of £53,073 for each UK home they sold last year.

Latest results show profit levels of £811 million which is up 19 per cent on the previous year.

Despite this affordable home levels are just 20 per cent across the development.

Next stages

Greenwich Council’s Planning Board are due to decide on another 135 homes this coming week on site.

I looked at plans in early October.

What will be of interest is how future stages respond the the dual carriageway and large roundabout leading to east Greenwich and nearby superstores.

For 20 years there’s been the bare minimum of work carried out to create attractive and safe links between new Peninsula homes and existing shops and services in Charlton and east Greenwich.

There’s little sign of that changing. A principle reason could be the forthcoming Silvertown Tunnel. Planners may desire that vehicle primacy remains with an increase in traffic expected, though that meets an increase in pedestrians and local residents. How that conflict plays out will be a keen watch.

My betting, based on many years watching the area develop, is that Greenwich Highways want to keep the car king on fast flowing dual carriageways across the area leading to ever more conflict with residents.

Other forthcoming plots in the area include a contentious tower near an ecological park that was rejected last year. New plans are being drawn up.