Forum Topic

Waitrose site should kick start the building of housing in West Ealing

With the news that the Waitrose/John Lewis development has been approved, the council should also start or continue building the approved projects.If you've approved them, build them.I'm sure John Lewis won't be hanging around with their development; however, Mayor Khan and Ealing council are now showing how poor they are at building housing, even when this is considered a priority by the government, which has paid the mayor over £4.8 billion to build houses.(Yes, £4.8 billion) Yet we are seeing no evidence of this in West EalingThe Orion Park development - work was intended to start at the beginning of May - no actionDean's Gardens flat - demolish or continue building.Ealing Broadway Schemes - stalledGurnell Site - approved but no funding ( £4.8 billion of money for house building)The local council's record on housing is less than flattering.If you've approved it, build it - "don't leave our area with half-built projects and overgrown bombsites"

Bill Trenchard ● 2d9 Comments

>As a weekly Waitrose customer, I can't say I'm looking forward to the disruption of this build.At least it'll fix the disruption of the roof leaking when it rains!

Paul James ● 9h

>Manor Road is currently chaotic as the very tall thin tower block slowly rises on a tiny siteWhenever I travel in that area during rush hours it's chaotic becuase there are too many cars.

Paul James ● 10h

The Lammas Park scheme is indicative of the arrogant attitude of the councillors and officers running LBE. They did no safety assessments or even a flood risk assessment before agreeing to the scheme. As it stands there is no published justification for the work, just the blithe climate crisis bull. The Local Government Ombudsman report has yet to be released and it will be interesting to see whether it finds that the scheme is justified.The council has belatedly accepted some of the recommendations in the RoSPA report it commissioned earlier this year. They are likely to be inadequate to ensure the safety of park users, particularly small children, who previously enjoyed unfettered access to the part of the park. One only has to see how many footballs lie in the depths of the craters to see where an immediate safety concern is. I suspect the whole pond area will eventually be fenced off, which was never in the original plan (such as that was).It’s simple greenwashing to facilitate the building of ever more huge tower blocks in central Ealing.As for undeveloped sites with granted planning permission there’s the Orion Park space opposite Northfields station that remains empty years after demolition of the old buildings.The problem is that the likes of Mason, Driscoll et al are nowhere near as clever as they like to believe. Developers expect to make a minimum 25 percent profit on any scheme and with the current market state in construction that’s difficult. Hence the land banking. It also means less or no social housing and surreptitious increases in scale under the laughably termed ‘minor material amendments’ clause. Usually without any public scrutiny.There’s an element of social cleansing behind all this. Get the young, fit and well-heeled in who don’t need schools, medical care and all the other infrastructure that a proper town needs to thrive. That’s why these CGI graphics always show happy cyclists sipping coffee in the dappled shade outside some mythical cafe. It’s not real life and it’s not sustainable.At some point people will realise what’s happening to the areas in which they live but by then it might be too late. It already is for West Ealing.

Simon Hayes ● 11h

Thanks as ever Eric for adding the intellectual detail. I forgot three more "bomb sites". 1)The Town Hall. 2) The Victoria Hall and 3) Lammas Park. The cuts means to me that the council are hard-up. When the chips are down you use every asset don't you? You make and save pennies wherever you can. Looks like the behaviour of some spoilt rich kid to me.Then there is the devastation of Lammas Park.The council sent many of us an A4 sheet with no information about how this crater would work. How many cubic meters of water it would store. The mechanism for letting this water back into the storm drains. The names and qualifications of the designers or indeed which Councillors signed this off.I'd hazard a guess that this Borough has done more damage to itself than the Luftwaffe did during the last war.

Arthur Breens ● 13h

If JLP start the Waitrose demolition in 2026, we'll have chaos in and around there for 3 years. Manor Road is currently chaotic as the very tall thin tower block slowly rises on a tiny site. As JLP is forecasting a £70 million loss on the development, and a recession is looming - maybe the project might never get off the ground.JLP has zero experience as a residential landlord. Some well established landlords are struggling. Why does JLP think it can do better? It appears that no work is proceeding on the Majestic Wine site in Hastings Road, just across the road from Manor Road. Anyone know why?Someone is planning to build on the old Woolworths site next to the new Lidl's on West Ealing Broadway. New housing? Oh no - it will be an 'apartment hotel'. It's 251869FUL on the Council's planning web site pages. This actually means longer stay flats for who exactly? Tourists perhaps? We did recently have an 'apartment hotel' slightly east of this site opposite Dean Gardens. However after a few years it closed..

Eric Alan Leach ● 13h

Ealing we understand has a long waiting list for housing. There are three large demolished building sites growing lilac along the Uxbridge Road between Ealing Broadway and West Ealing. They have been vacant for years. Where is the urgency in this housing crisis? Couldn't these sites be used for temporary accommodation like park homes? Why are these sites empty? Are the owners just waiting for the best offer to come along? Can't those clever officers and members of the council attempt to fill these sites? They go to these property fairs. Is it just for the jolly? Meanwhile I see shops boarded-up in West Ealing ....ready for demolition while these old sites remain empty.Please tell me I have it all wrong.

Arthur Breens ● 22h

Another nail in the borough’s coffinInfrastructure anyone?Nah…..

Colin Goodman ● 1d

As a weekly Waitrose customer, I can't say I'm looking forward to the disruption of this build.However, building new flats for rent does seem like a great idea. John Lewis have a good reputation as an employer and will hopefully be a good landlord too.

Susan Kelly ● 2d

Hmmmm, lots of reasons why things aren’t being built.Deans Gardens will have to be demolished as the original contractor went bust and any new developer won’t risk taking on a half built structure that potentially has lots of problems.Gurnell is an LBE development, through its Broadway Living arm (funded by a £400m loan underwritten by Ealing taxpayers). Given the track record of that operation Gurnell is likely to turn into a money pit. Don’t expect partner developers to be rushing to put their cash in.Orion Park. Anyone’s guess.If you wonder why nothing is built when planning is granted years before consider that developers expect to make a minimum 25 percent profit on any new builds. That’s why social housing is cut and cut. None at all at the John Lewis site and only 19 percent “affordable” (50 percent in the original planning application).There are 300,000 planning consents already granted across London that remain unbuilt. Ask yourself why.Ealing is incompetent when it comes to planning. Inappropriate high rise development in traditional low rise residential areas goes through because no monitoring reports are done to show how much has already been built/approved/begun. Nobody accepts responsibility at the council for failing to complete these legally required documents and the cabinet portfolio holder appears to be way out of his depth. They refused to even put the John Lewis scheme to committee, yet if you want to add an extension to your house you have to jump through every hoop. Why is that I wonder?

Simon Hayes ● 2d