Councillor Tony Belton’s Battersea May 2022, Newsletter (# 155)
- I started this newsletter 13 years ago as a Latchmere Ward Newsletter. On Thursday, 5th May, thanks to the Boundary Commissioners, Latchmere disappears; not the pub of course nor the estate but the political entity, a political entity which dates back to the late nineteenth century, and the creation of the old Metropolitan Borough of Battersea. It also means for me the end of forty years, of representing the ward on the Council. But, I hope to continue on 6th May representing Battersea Park, which includes about 35% of the old Latchmere Ward. My Labour colleagues, in Battersea Park ward, are Juliana Annan and Maurice McLeod, whilst my old Latchmere colleagues Simon Hogg and Kate Stock are the Labour candidates for Falconbrook ward.
- Wandsworth Council has been in purdah during the last month before the Borough election. That means that Council politics stopped for the month and that the only significant meeting for councillors was 26th April’s Planning Applications Committee (PAC). There were, however, several major applications to be considered, with considerable implications for Battersea, namely Burridge Gardens, the Bridges Court site, Battersea Square and the British Lion site, Thessaly Road.
- Battersea residents will know that the old Peabody estate (“Burridge Gardens”), has been in a demi-world state of demolition and reconstruction for the last ten years. Hopefully, the application, which the Council approved last week, will be the start of the last chapter of the process! You will be interested to know that I and two other Labour members of the Committee voted against the proposal, not because we were against new homes but because the proportion of family-friendly and socially-rented homes was once again scaled back. George Peabody, the nineteenth-century American philanthropist, who spent many of his US dollars building the original Peabody Estates for the poor of London, would have been horrified.
- We were “merely” approving “detailed changes” to a
previously approved application, at the Bridges Court site, at the junction of Lombard Road and York Road. The detailed changes included an extra 41 residential units! However, 35% of the 177 residential units are said to be affordable, which by the standard of many private sector applications is good. Nevertheless, I have serious environmental concerns about having a 25-storey block at this location. Aren’t we supposed to have a care for the wider urban environment?
- The Battersea Square site was an application for the expansion of Thomas School to make it a small/medium-sized independent school for approximately 440 pupils. The development will not change the general physical appearance of Battersea Square, but many local people are, and will continue to be, concerned about the traffic implications of expanding the school. We were assured by the officers that there would not be insurmountable problems, but I have my doubts!
- My fellow Labour Councillor Sheila Boswell raised the interesting issue of school spatial standards, by which she meant “Isn’t this a very small site to have 400+ adolescent boys running around? Are there not any standards that need to be applied?” She really didn’t get a straight answer to that question, so let me provide it. There were indeed guidelines but they were abandoned and ignored by Mrs Thatcher’s Government in the early 1980s, when the ToryParty was intent on increasing the provision of private education.
- And finally, there was a relatively small and uncontroversial application for a block of 17 flats on the British Lion site, Thessaly Road. This picture of the old pub, which then was known as Maloney’s is shown as a reminder that it has been an empty site for 15 years! I am sure that Carey Gardens residents will be more than pleased to get some new neighbours.
- Meanwhile, most councillors have been fully involved in election campaigning. For my part, I have met many new Battersea Park electors. One meeting was with Connaught Mansions residents. It was held in Salesian House, Surrey Lane, on 27th April, and facilitated by Battersea Communities. The residents resolved to establish themselves as a regular working group; I am pleased to report that the owners welcomed this development, claiming to look forward to resident involvement in the block’s planned regeneration. I have some experience of the issues that arise during regeneration on this scale though mainly in the public sector. I hope that I can bring that experience to bear in Connaught Mansions to advantage.
- Earlier in the month, I accompanied Penny to Rome, where she
was holding business meetings with her academic colleagues. It’s a few years since I was last in Rome. During that time, further areas of the old city have been excavated and opened up to the public. The eternal city is as stunning as ever. Penny and I went by train and stopped overnight in Turin, which was a far more impressive city than I had expected. On the return journey, the star event was lunch at the station buffet in Gare de l’Est in Paris. The station buffet “Le Train Bleu” was built and opened in 1901. We stopped there for lunch between trains – a bit different from Clapham Junction station. I recommend it for anyone who has a couple of hours to spare between the Channel Tunnel train and any further train from Gare de L’Est! The food was excellent but not very expensive – and the total ambience very French.
- We also squeezed in a couple of days in the Forest of Dean, on the
Welsh border. It was deliberately a very quiet break, with visits to Chepstow, Monmouth and the Wye Valley, which as you can see is spectacularly scenic!
My programme for May
Regular readers will know that I normally announce here what my plans are for the coming month. But on this occasion, almost everything depends upon the result of the election on Thursday, 5th May. The one thing that is certain is that the Council’s Annual Meeting is on 25th May.
Did you Know?
Last month, I asked, “Who was the man (trained by the celebrated architect John Nash) who shaped much of Battersea Park and is commemorated in the name of a Latchmere (Falconbrook) council block – soon to be demolished?”
The answer is Sir James Pennethorne (1801-71), who was born in Worcester, came to London to train as an architect under Nash and designed both Victoria and Battersea Parks, probably the largest public spaces created in Britain during Victorian times.
And this month?
In Battersea Park, there is something called the Ballast Wall. Do you know where it is and what it is? And why it is so different from any other structure in Battersea Park?
Tony Belton
Tony Belton 