Consultation on up to 1,400 homes at Greenwich Ikea car park site
A consultation will take place next week offering further insights into plans for up to 1,400 homes at Millennium Retail Park’s car park in Greenwich.
London Square are behind plans for the site which sits between the A102 and retail sheds such as IKEA and the Odeon cinema. Car parking would be retained under the development.
One image shows homes on the current B&Q store site. It was reported in late 2020 that London Square were in talks to buy the car park. B&Q was not mentioned at the time.
A public square may sit above parking spaces with a “green wall” facing the Blackwall Tunnel approach. The developer states: “Around 4,000 sqm of new commercial space will be created around the new public square, including shops, cafés and restaurants that will benefit residents and create new employment opportunities for local people.” They state their may be space for a smaller hardware store before: “Notwithstanding this, there is another B&Q store a short drive from Greenwich, in Sydenham.”
The plan would see pedestrian links towards Greenwich Millennium Village but what happens on Bugsby’s Way remains to be seen. So far a number of plots approved at GMV has seen Greenwich Council ignore better pedestrian links.
The consultation website mentions North Greenwich tube in a section on connections and transport but appears to ignore the nearby national Westcombe Park rail station with frequent Southeastern and Thameslink services. This is something seen again and again on the Peninsula with links to east Greenwich and railway stations often ignored.
The Ikea development did the same. Very little of the £1.7 million they paid towards Greenwich Council for transport improvements went towards improving pedestrian links.
The online event on 25 and 29 March will hopefully shed light on various issues. Click here to view details on how to attend.
This site will bring total levels on the Peninsula to well over 20,000. Aside from Knight Dragon, there is Morden Wharf and adjacent Enderby Wharf phase two.
Greenwich Millennium Village also still has a number of plots unbuilt.
Is this scale of new high rise buildings with thousands upon thousands of units mentioned frequently in your column, happening all over the borough and all over London? Or just in the areas of prime sites preferred by developers who stand to make huge profits, close to riverside and stations? Is it a free for all for any developer with the cash?, or am I being naive to assume there’s some kind of overall plan, which is to provide a decent living environment for all – current residents, long established ones and new arrivals? Or is it pile em high, cram them in, sell em off, and disappear onto the next unfortunate area to suffer construction blight, over density of population, lack of greenery, lack of social facilities, poor road planning, and the eventual high crime rates as these massive ‘estates’ are left to deteriorate. We all need space to breathe whats left of the clean air. Pollutants don’t solely come from cars, but also from home heating, and we are being surrounded by high rise, spoiling our air quality, our views, and increasing our crime levels whilst reducing our policing. Do they ever stop and think of the effect this rapid change has on the people who have lived here for decades? Do they care that people are frightened to walk their dogs at night when they never used to worry? Yes there’s a shortage of housing, there always has been, but this is fast losing the character and camaraderie and community spirit of Greenwich that I once loved. Guess it’s time to move on.
Why on earth would you build.. or rather buy, flats in between two extremely busy businesses?
The assumption that people do not like living in busy, urban areas is wrong. Many people do. I have lived in busy areas and loved it – mostly out of London in other UK cities as too expensive in London most of the time – with many amenities on your doorstep and great transport links to work and entertainment. It works for many, many people though as one gets older people then start to seek a different type of living, though as much of Europe shows apartment living for families also works very well.
That isn’t to raise issues about affordability, cost, congestion and pollution but densely populated urban living can be great – if well planned with suitable services.
In terms of crime it’s a lot more complex – low rise ghettos in the states for example have high crime rates, while dense areas of cities all over the world can be – and are – very safe. Access to jobs, support and community links are important. For community feel, it’s often the case I felt more at home with good neighbours in blocks rather than low rise housing on neglected estates.
The B&Q in Eltham is far closer than Sydenham.
This is a ridiculous place to build. It’s all about greed.
Having just received your brochure around the proposals to build a retail park on the Ikea / B&Q car park site in Greenwich, I’m quite frankly astounded! With the introduction of ULEZ and the ridiculous cycle lanes that have already caused traffic chaos, this would cause Greenwich to reach breaking point!
There quite simply ISN’T the infrastructure to accommodate building MORE new homes, and MORE retail outlets to add to already increased traffic that Ikea, Sainsbury’s, and the Stone Lake Retail park have ALREADY caused for us local residents. Stop dressing up this nonsense as being “for the community” because it quite simply isn’t! Stop putting money into the pockets of real estate investors and developers, and instead focus on things that will make the local community actually be able to MOVE in and around the Greenwich area.
We can’t ALL cycle everywhere, and we don’t ALL get excited by yet another shiny new block of flats. What we instead want is our normal regular size roads back, so the emergency services can get past / through the traffic, we can go back to overtaking busses safely, and delivery vans can go back to loading and unloading safely in shops along Trafalgar Road.
Surely home alongside th A102 will be car pollution death traps waiting to happen.
The Peninsula development began around 25 years ago. An ‘ecological’ Sainsbury’s built then was torn down in 2018 to facilitate a big box Sainsbury’s further along Woolwich Road and make way for IKEA. This was a short life for an ‘ecological’ building. The original masterplan for the Peninsula was for 12-13,000 homes. This number was doubled more recently in a stunningly bad deal with developers that left this big new population without adequate plans for schools, health services etc (you have to think about this stuff before you start rhapsodising abut cafe culture), and very little social housing. Greenwich has made appalling planning decisions, creating ‘car-led’ retail developments all along Woolwich Road and Bugsbys Way in the past two decades – all the time knowing perfectly well about climate change, car use and ownership. The Silvertown Tunnel will mean a massive carbon-costly build plus an 8-lane highway through the Peninsula to feed two tunnel mouths. So now we will have more cars and more people. The little local shops south of Woolwich Road are all being forced out of business by the big boxes. The North Greenwich station area is a park ‘n ride desert with just chain restaurants and shops basically for Dome visitors. Central Greenwich is now given over to tourist stuff. RBG has failed miserably even to carry out limited pedestrianisation of the town centre. The carbon cost of this is enormous and existing open space will come under colossal pressure. Retail shopping is failing, and was already failing before the pandemic – so the glib ‘job creation’ doesn’t wash. Dig up the car park and grow trees – please, no more half occupied ‘investment-opportunity’ high rise flats developments. There’s a decent cheap cafe at IKEA already and a load of under-utilised places to eat around the cinema. talk about killing the golden goose … And if no B&Q, how about developing localised, independent, tool shops, hardware, DIY, upholstery, upcycling, horticultural and other community businesses. PLEASE no more overpriced cappuccino. There are far too many families dependent on foodbanks around here now.