Blocks continue redevelopment of former News International site
Patel Taylor’s plans for 547 new homes in east London have won the backing of Tower Hamlets councillors.
The practice’s proposals for developer Berkeley Group’s St George subsidiary will deliver the homes in blocks of 16 and 22 storeys in Wapping. There will also be 418sq m of flexible commercial space.
The development is part of the former News International printworks site where The Sun, The News of the World, The Times and The Sunday Times were produced. It was previously London Dock.
In 2014, Berkeley Group secured hybrid consent for the redevelopment of the site with up to 1,800 new homes, alongside a new secondary schoool and around 20,800sq m of commercial space.
Last week’s decision by members of Tower Hamlets’ Strategic Development Committee effectively allows the developer to exceed the original new-homes limit by 248 units as part of the phase.
The development team proposed that 43% of the phase’s homes would be “affordable”, measured by habitable room, adding up to a total of 227 units.
According to the report to the meeting, 100 of the affordable homes will be “intermediate” – indicating shared ownership or London Living Rent. The remaining properties, around half of which will have either three or four bedrooms, will be for affordable rent.
Recommending the scheme for approval, council planning officers said the design, height, massing and architectural appearance of Patel Taylor’s proposals would “respond positively to the existing and emerging local context”.
“The proposal would preserve the character and appearance of the St George in the East Conservation Area, as well as preserving the significance derived from setting and features of special architectural or historic interest of nearby listed buildings, principally Pennington Street Warehouses, Tobacco Dock and St George in the East Church,” they said.
Officers noted that the new building would “introduce significant additional bulk and massing” that would affect the backdrop of the grade I-listed Tobacco Dock. However they said the harm woud be “less than substantial”, in the language of the National Planning Policy Framework.
They added that while the proposals would be visible within the setting of the grade I-listed St George in the East church and its grade II-listed wall, the new blocks would “appear subservient”.
The proposed blocks are directly south of the Pennington Street Warehouses, which are grade II-listed. Officers said that clear views of the warehouses were limited because of their low profile, but that the scheme would cause “less than substantial” harm to the building that was virtually the same as the impact of the hybrid plans consented in 2014.
Officers said government heritage adviser Historic England had not objected to the proposals and that any harm to the nearby historic buidings was “significantly outweighed” by the public benefits of the proposals.
They added that the public benefits of the 547-home proposals were “significanty greater” than the 2014 scheme.
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