Enderby Riverside revised plans: Have your say

The developers for the Enderby Riverside site have put in a revised planning application.

The consutation period only lasts until Wednesday 13th May.

Our involvement

Over the last couple of months EGRA has attended three closed meetings with representatives of Cruise Britain and the Enderby Riverside development.

Barratt London, in a joint venture with Morgan Stanley Real Estate Investing, is the developer behind the Enderby Riverside site. It was granted planning permission in 2012 for 770 apartments. Planning consent was also given for a cruise liner terminal and a 250-bed hotel.

Now those plans have changed and it’s the cruise liner terminal that’s at the heart of the changes.

While we do not oppose the cruise terminal in principle, provided it does not lead to an unacceptable increase in air pollution, noise and traffic, we do have some major concerns about the developer’s plans.

Our main concerns:

Changes to cruises

The changes to the original plan are the result of a change in EU legislation which restricts the number of days ships can stay at sea because of emissions.

This new legislation means the developers want to change the way the cruise terminal will work.

Terminal Building

There will be fewer ships than originally forecast in 2012, but they will stay longer, as the terminal will now be a start and end point for cruises.

55 ships are expected to be moored at Enderby’s between April and September and they will stay for 3-5 days.

The terminal building will be 81% larger than first planned in order to process passengers embarking on their voyages plus their luggage.

More flats proposed

This larger terminal has to be paid for.

The developers propose building two towers near the riverside, Blocks Y and Z. Block Y will be 23 storeys high and will have 113 flats. Block Z will be 31 storeys high and will be home to 150 dwellings.

These two blocks will have no affordable housing in them - the idea is that they will generate the income required for the new terminal.

There is a further block planned for the rear of the site, Block A. It’s proposed this will have 9 storeys at one end and 26 at the other, this is where the affordable housing will be.

The developers already had planning permission to build 93 apartments here. Now they are proposing to build a further 121 in this block.

The three blocks combined represent an increase of 384 apartments from the original plans.

Under this proposal the overall affordable housing provision for the site drops to 16% from the 20% promised by Barratt London when it unveiled its plans back in July 2013.

EGRA believes the income from the additional units will be far in excess of the capital required to fund the new terminal plans. We also believe the reduction in the proportion of social housing is not justified.

If the latest plans go ahead, the hotel, promised in the original consented application, will be scrapped, with the two riverside tower blocks taking its place.

Density

The London Plan suggests that 400-700 habitable rooms per hectare (hr/ha) is appropriate for this kind of development.

The entire Enderby site (2012) has planning permission which equates to 779 hr/ha, which went up to 785 hr/ha in 2014 when additional planning permission was granted.

By our calculations this current application comes to a density of 818 hr/ha.

Enderby House

The early nineteenth century listed house, believed by some to have been the home of the Enderby family, will be completely dwarfed by the new towers and will look totally out of context alongside the new terminal building.

Traffic and emissions

EGRA has two major concerns here:

Firstly traffic bringing passengers to and fro will enter the site via Blackwall Lane, which is already congested, and could become more so once the proposed IKEA is opened on the peninsula.

And secondly, as we understand it, the ships will not be able to take their electricity from shore, so will need to have generators running, causing pollution and noise.

A study of the air quality in East Greenwich undertaken by EGRA has already established something we all suspected - that levels of air pollution are bad in our area – and that’s without adding cruise ship emissions to the mix.

EGRA has asked Greenwich Council to undertake a full Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) on the cruise ship emissions and the increased traffic.

You only have until Wednesday 13th May to tell the council what you think!

Don’t throw away the chance to make your voice heard.