Abbey Wood car wash closing this week to make way for 282 homes
A car wash in Abbey Wood is closing this week as work is set to begin on constructing 282 homes in Abbey Wood at the junction of Harrow Manorway and Eynsham Drive.
The adjacent PDSA vets is set to move to a new site a few metres away in an industrial estate while building work is carried out, before returning to a new unit on site.
The development has a contentious history long covered on this site. It’s not so much about new homes, as the design is decent enough and it’s a short walk to Abbey Wood station. A perfect site for housing given local amenities and transport links.
Rather it’s because Greenwich Council decided to allocate absolutely nothing from £1.2 million income the developer will pay the authority.
The adjacent estate is one of the most deprived not just in Greenwich borough but all of London. In fact, parts are in the bottom ten per cent nationally for deprivation.
Greenwich Council still didn’t feel it was worth allocating income towards improving conditions on the long neglected estate.
After local complaints, the developer themselves opted to offer £50,000. Penny change really in the overall total and a pretty shameful episode for Greenwich Council, though far from isolated.
The estate is fundamentally good design, yet neglected for decades by Greenwich council.
New homes
The site sits opposite over 500 homes in Thamesmead now approaching completion. That’s in Bexley borough.
Down the other end of Harrow Manorway there are two towers now rising bringing more than 200 new homes. That’s another site Greenwich failed to capture income to benefit the nearby estate.
Beside that site are plans for 600 homes at Lyndean Industrial Estate. This is nowhere near an application submission so it’s unlikely discussions between Greenwich Council officers and the developer on income and allocation are underway.
Greenwich have long claimed they cannot use income from Section106 to benefit areas such as neglected estates. It’s a nonsense. They could always use s106 income, and despite changes in recent years they still can by pooling resources.
They can also do so via Community Infrastructure Levy income but have made mistakes in that area including failing to revise in 2018 as promised when introduced in 2015. It still hasn’t been revised.
