Lewisham: The Bigger Picture

You take the blue pill - the story ends, you wake up in your bed and believe whatever you want to believe. You take the red pill - you stay in Wonderland and I show you how deep the rabbit-hole goes.
- Morpheus

Chided by one of our regular contributers for failing to understand the "bigger picture" in Lewisham, we have ventured down the rabit hole of Lewisham planning to check on the status of the Loampit Vale development, which is adjacent to the not-yet-underway Lewisham Gateway scheme.

There is a public consultation coming up, which we will try to cover and which of course we will gladly take your contributions about.

But in the mean time, here's what Cllr Alexander had to say about this one:

"On the recent planning application that has come in for the new leisure centre and housing on Loampit Vale, we believe this to be one of only a small number of schemes to be given approval by the Barratt's board - good news for Lewisham.

"The planning application is out to public consultation however Barratt's did do some earlier consultation work which showed a considerable amount of support for the scheme. The initial drawings I have seen are fantastic. The leisure centre will be incredible and I am very pleased with the way in which the design of the residential element has progressed. I have always been keen to incorporate some larger, affordable homes in this scheme and believe the architects have come up with some innovative solutions, especially around the provision of good quality outside space.

"I have also been keen to keep the carbon footprint of the new leisure centre and housing to a minimum and the scheme includes a Combined Heat and Power Plant which will provide both electricity and heat. The location of the scheme next to the train station and DLR is also important and enables us to keep car parking levels low - although there will clearly be an appropriate amount for both the leisure centre and housing."