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Betrayal claims as 'Half-Penny Whistle' tower in Ealing wins Mayor's backing
Mira Bar-Hillel, Property Correspondent19 Dec 2008
PLANS for a 25-storey tower in Ealing town centre, designed by Lord Foster, are set to go ahead after the local council approved the scheme and the Mayor signalled support.
The green light for the replacement of the 40-storey "Penny Whistle" design will cast fresh doubts over Boris Johnson's election commitment to resist the building of towers in low-rise suburbs where there is strong local resistance.
Campaigner Victor Mishiku said: "This tower is totally out of keeping with the area, where most buildings are no higher than three storeys.
"We feel betrayed by our council - and by the Mayor, who seems to be reneging on all his election promises on planning and green issues."
Although the new tower is 15 storeys shorter than the original, it is chunkier and contains 567 flats, down from 704 in the earlier design. Only 79 will be "affordable".
The developer, Glenkerrin, withdrew Lord Foster's original scheme in April following criticism by government's conservation and design watchdogs. At that time former Mayor Ken Livingstone supported the height, while Mr Johnson said it was an example of the kind of suburban tower he would oppose.
The overall scheme will involve the demolition of a site near Ealing Broadway station and its replacement with six new buildings.
Council officers said: "Development would be high-density in recognition of the site's location in a metropolitan centre with high public transport accessibility."
In his letter to Ealing council this week, the Mayor "expressed satisfaction that the latest revisions represented significant improvements in the design and quality of the scheme".
Mr Johnson also suggested that the number of affordable homes should be raised, if viable.
Glenkerrin director Sean O'Gorman said: "Our proposals have evolved over a number of months in response to consultation with a wide range of stakeholders.
"We recognise that approving the application was a brave step by councillors.
"We firmly believe that they made the right decision".
Mr Mishiku claimed that local people were turfed out of the public gallery during the planning committee meeting because all the seats had been reserved by the developer.
He said: "We were not allowed to attend the committee meeting or make our opinions known to the members on the day."
Reader views (14)
I understand that at a 'consultation' meeting several months ago, a member of Ealing council stated that the two developments would go ahead soon (this one and Dicken's Yard). I was invited to speak at the meeting but it seemed to me from the beginning to be a sham and pointless giving them the opportunity to parade under the guise of allowing residents to speak.
The short term gains in S106 monies will soon be spent. Ealing is the council that was recently highlighted in the press as accommodating benefits claimants in a £1.2million detached house.
This kind of short term windfall grabbing, squeezing extortionate levels of commercial rates, and lack of decent high schools in central Ealing has been driving out retail/commerce and the 'despised' middle class families for years. Successive councils have been slowly strangling the goose that lays the golden egg, but now they've chopped its head off.
Boris - where were you when we needed you?
- Eunice Chen, London, 22/12/2008 18:57
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As someone living in Crystal Palace it is interesting to note that it is not just this area that has suffered from Boris doing a U-turn on election promises, a whitewash at the hands of the local council and a debacle of a planning application meeting. I - and I suspect many others - empathise with the people of Ealing who would prefer to see a better and more appropriate development in their town centre. Perhaps it is time Londoners got together to push for a new system for submitting and reviewing development plans. A new authority independent of inept local councils perhaps? Just a suggestion!
- David Kay, Crystal Palace, London, 22/12/2008 10:05
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I use to live near Ealing Broadway and from my recollection the place was a dump.
Half of me thinks that those whining should be grateful that someone’s actually bothered investing in such a hole while my other half thinks ‘what a waste of money’!
Would have been better spent in a more deserving area. Not that I care, I jumped the UK sinking ship years ago :o)
- Jc, HCMC Vietnam, 22/12/2008 03:14
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I was at the Planning Meeting that approved this application on Wednesday and it was a whitewash. The Planning team, after admitting (inappropriately smugly, I thought)to having double-counted the supporters' correspondence, established that the objectors outnumbered them by 2:1. Projected images of the finished development as viewed from key vantage points showed an execrable, uninspired, bulky, ugly, shopping complex with several floors of cramped apartments above. There is insufficient green amenity space for residents (even counting the small balconies in the tower!). And horror of horrors, the development places a myriad of anonymous residential windows within leering distance (with or without binoculars) of a Primary School playground - a point dismissed without either sensitivity or insight by the Officers. Not one of the arguments in favour of this development was intrinsic to this specific design; an alternative, imaginative, inspirational (and iconic) development could have delivered the connectivity, energy and regeneration that our Town Centre so needs whilst maintaining or enhancing its character. Shame on you Planners for imposing an irreversible loss of character on this Conservation Area of predominantly Victorian and Edwardian architectural heritage.
- Carolyn Brown, Hanwell, 20/12/2008 12:31
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Paul Hopkins - I'm pleased to see you like the idea of large blocks of buildings around the station area because if you find Villiers House acceptable, you're gonna loooove Arcadia.
K Williams - I objected at the planning meeting about the redevelopment design because I think it is inappropriate for Ealing. No one - not one single objector EVER - has said they didn't want redevelopment at all. What we want is redevelopment on a human scale.
- Allison Franklin, Ealing, London, 20/12/2008 09:23
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The 'whingers' would like well designed sustainable development that does not blight Ealing Town Centre. Just because Sir Norm designed it does not make it suitable for Ealing or any other Town Centre for that matter similar to Ealing. Save Ealing Centre have come up with alternative proposals that many residents have supported, the meeting on the 17th December was a travesty of local democracy....
- D Gll, Ealing, 20/12/2008 09:09
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The entire development is inappropriate from the environment,traffic chaos,danger to
school children plus many other points of view given by expert voices in protest against
these high rise blocks.All opposing points of view were ignored completely by the
planning committee,comprised of mostly doubtful councillors seemingly biased toward the Irish bidder.
As an admirer of Boris Johnson I feel,together with thousands of Ealing residents,a sense of betrayal.We relied on him as a last hope to stop these huge blocks of flats/retail without any leisure or cultural area, being dumped next to Haven Green.
Hopefully a good wind or similar will take the 27 story glass house down.
- Anthony Roden, Ealing,London, 20/12/2008 01:02
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The reality is once Crossrail arrives Ealing will become the western equivelent to Croydon. Without the Trams (well you never know do you?)
As for wishing you did not vote for Boris well wait to the commuters get his Christmas present when they renew their season tickets. (Should have gone to Ken Savers.)
- Melvyn Windebank, Canvey Island, Essex, 19/12/2008 21:31
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The Betrayal of Victorian-Built Ealing:
My comment to the press was that the original residential buildings on the Victorian Hanger Hill Estate, Ealing (part of the 962 acres in Central Ealing owned by Edward Wood Esq., benefactor to the Ealing Board) are mostly two or three storeys (only a few with basements), i.e. Castlebar Road, Longfield Road, Carlton Road, Carlton Gardens, Haven Green, Mount Park Crescent, Gordon Road. They were described as a "ghetto"!
The shopping centre in the White City does not have 20 storeys of residential flats above it.
The combined number of flats proposed on the Town Hall/Dickens and Arcadia plots is some 1,265 Flats. There are over 1,000 car-parking spaces short from the hitherto expected ratio of one space per flat incl.300 spaces to be lost which were used by Ealing Council staff and also by the public at the end of the day.
NB. The article contains a typo at the end. The public did hear the meeting as they and the press were shunted two floors below where their signs and gasps at the sight of the projections could not be heard by the Committee. The many speakers against the application were clapped - but in the basement of the Town Hall (built because of the generosity of Edward Wood Esq), they could not be heard.
The Committee (where no local councillors bar the Chairman sat on the committee) only could hear the generous applause generated in the chamber by the developers and their allies for their own paid spokepersons!
- The Covenant Movement (V.Mishiku), Ealing, UK., 19/12/2008 21:02
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I do live in Ealing and I welcome the Tower. The whingers seem to be against anything new or exciting. They don't seem to have anything better to do than complain about money being spent in the Borough. Well done Boris.
- K Williams, London, 19/12/2008 19:28
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The building is designed by Norman Foster. Who can therefore criticise it?
- Patrick Griffin, Dalston, London, 19/12/2008 14:15
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I wish I never voted for Boris now. Somebody needs to challenge his fading election pledges in court or book him in for a memory check.
- Stephen, London, 19/12/2008 12:06
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Towers may be unimaginative but they can act as a focal point. Not everyone using the station will be a local so they will find it convenient to have a landmark to navigate their way back to the station! It is still a pity that another 5 storeys wwere not lopped off though!
- W R Stevenson, London, 19/12/2008 10:42
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How the hell can Victor Mishiku say the only buildings in the area are no more than 3 storeys high. I have lived in Ealing and there are a number of buildings in the vicinity over 3 storeys including a large office block at the station. Do you actually live in Ealing Victor? Well done the council and Mr Boris for giving the go ahead.
- Paul Hopkins, London, England, 19/12/2008 10:38
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