Antic pubs have withdrawn from the Greyhound

[Pat Trembath]

SimonO is wrong to state that " The original plans submitted for the site, worked up in partnership between the developer, Council and the Sydenham Society was for a development of around 70 flats on the site." We objected strongly when we learnt of these plans (and I doubt Lewisham would have been in favour either) and mounted the successful campaign to "Save the Greyhound".

The Sydenham Society was horrified to learn that Milford, the orginal developer who had bought the site, was going to demolish all the buildings and replace these with 70 flats in a series of blocks, one of which was 7 storeys high. For information the number of flats in the current development is 42.

At no stage was the Sydenham Society ever in "partnership with the developers". Nor are we currently in partnership with Purelake, although we have met with them to discuss their plans.

The Sydenham Society will be objecting to the current plans - certainly not the act of partners.

[Annie.]

I'm glad to hear you are going to object to the latest plan Pat,I think whoever allowed these plans to go ahead should have to stand up and justify them.I have no faith in Lewisham plannig dept,they really dont seem to give a damn

[ Post made via Mobile Device ]

[simono]

Oh dear Pat, I fear you miss out a stage. Yes the Sydenham Society objected to the demolition of the Greyhound building. But between that time and the existing plans I am sorry but did you did work in partnership with developers and I suggest you look at your own website entry of 1 November 2008.
I quote

"Since the beginning of 2008 the new developers have been in discussion with Lewisham’s planning officers. In August members of the Society were invited to meet 6a Architects (the developer’s chosen architectural practice) and dp9 (the developer’s planning consultants) and were shown a model of the proposed scheme.

Our initial response was to welcome the imaginative ideas being put forward for such an important town centre site. We did make some critical comments and were advised by the architects that these would be taken into consideration before the planning application was submitted to Lewisham Council. The Society has treated the privileged information confidentially, as was requested. However, the planning application is now being formally submitted to the council and the period of public consultation is beginning."

This was for plans for around 70 flats on the site and was supported by the Society when it was submitted. The only people who objected to the original development were the residents of the area around the site who would be directly affected and thankfully we got the size of the development reduced.

I would also add that I was invited for a cosy chat with a member of the society at the Dulwich Woodhouse to encourage me not to object to the development as this might imperil the development of the site! The Society did not support the local residents in their objections and it was only through our efforts that the development was reduced to its current size, albeit that most of the contibutors to this site agree that this is still too high and too dense.

As an aside Sainsbury's have now submitted a proposal to put air conditionaing units to the rear of the building that will further directly impact on local resdients. We have objected again to this but there is again a deafening silence from the Sydenham Society on matters that really matter to local people.

[Eagle]

Simon
Once you allow a supermarket surely not much you can do about aircon.

Out of order knocking Pat and the Society. They are a number of very well meaning people trying to do their best to improve the locality.

I cannon believe the financial benefit of one extra flat on top of a noisy pub will make much difference financially to the project. Not sure who would want to live on top of a Pub so expect max 150k.

[Tim Lund]

Oh dear Pat, I fear you miss out a stage. Yes the Sydenham Society objected to the demolition of the Greyhound building. But between that time and the existing plans I am sorry but did you did work in partnership with developers and I suggest you look at your own website entry of 1 November 2008.
I quote

"Since the beginning of 2008 the new developers have been in discussion with Lewisham’s planning officers. In August members of the Society were invited to meet 6a Architects (the developer’s chosen architectural practice) and dp9 (the developer’s planning consultants) and were shown a model of the proposed scheme.

Our initial response was to welcome the imaginative ideas being put forward for such an important town centre site. We did make some critical comments and were advised by the architects that these would be taken into consideration before the planning application was submitted to Lewisham Council. The Society has treated the privileged information confidentially, as was requested. However, the planning application is now being formally submitted to the council and the period of public consultation is beginning."

It might be worth here putting in a link to that page - so here it is. The same goes for anything else relating to these planning matters - excepting of course 'privileged information' given in confidence - since documents will be available on Lewisham's Planning pages

On a personal note, I find this all acutely embarrassing, since I was chair of Sydsoc at the time, but in all honesty, I had little clue as to what was going on. I took the view that it was one of the areas Pat was well on top of, and which did not require my personal involvement. I view the whole saga now with a feeling of resignation, similar to that I felt when I resigned after two years as Sydsoc Chair. I appreciate that this level of detachment is not so easy for Simono.

In similarly reflective vein, I wonder how future local historians will cover this. Lewisham's Planning pages will already be of immense help, but thanks to this Forum, and also sites such as SydSoc's, they may feel themselves overwhelmed by background information, and wonder whether it is worth trying to get behind the identities of former active but anonymous posters on this matter, e.g. 'Nasaroc', 'Big Ben' and 'Muddy Waters'.

Such future historians will also face the problem that relevant internet material may be removed. There is nothing to stop those of us who post on this site from deleting what we have posted, and very little of the material on SydSoc's previous site has been retained on its current site. Most of it, however, will be available from the printed SydSoc newsletters.

Of greater value would be sight of the privileged information and accounts of the sorts of 'cosy chats' in the Dulwich Woodhouse Simono refers to, and there probably are interesting emails left on servers somewhere in cyberspace, or saved on PCs. Understanding the financial considerations affecting both LB Lewisham and developers would also be important, so requiring some competence in accounting and local government finance. But I for one do not have the time, energy or all the relevant skills to do what is needed for such a contemporary local historical investigation, and even though it's possible that a group of people could work together on this, it would not be easy for their efforts to be co-ordinated.

It would amount to asking for our own local Leveson Inquiry, but as Eagle rightly observes here "Enquiries cost us vast amounts of money". I doubt very much if LB Lewisham could justify such expenditure. Failing that, I suspect discussions on this truly independent local Forum will be the most useful source for future local historians, which is why I feel they are valuable, recording the views of more or less well informed local people, including those who, by using aliases, feel uncomfortable about revealing their identities.

Another point - which I have made elsewhere - arises from Simono's observation that "The [Sydenham] Society did not support the local residents in their objections", which is the legitimacy of any group which is represented as the voice of the community. An aspect of what I call 'romancing the community' is the idea that there is some level of society - "communities" - where everyone is of one mind, so making it possible to talk of the 'voice of the community', and encouraging those in power to identify groups who represent such mythical entities, and garner their support to legitimise decisions actually taken from above. In this case Simono demonstrates that such a unanimous community does not exist in relation to the Greyhound development, but his account of 'cosy chats' illustrates how those who use the myth seek to maintain it by discouraging dissent.

It is the same folly that for many years led the UK government to take extreme Islamicists as the voice of the vast peaceful majority of UK muslims. How ingrained the idiocy is can be seen in the very name of the government department which deals with local government - the Department of Communities and Local Government - and the fact that it tweets using the id "@communitiesUK". When you think about it, this thinking undermines proper, responsible local government, which I would prefer to focus on more objective assessments of the public good.

[ALIB]

I am in favour of transparency over how the decision-making process was achieved. I would like full disclosure, but doubt this would ever happen.

I would also be interested in why Millford Homes sold the site on (shortly after the Greyhound failed to burn down), and what the relationship between Millford and Purelake is.

Interesting , is also the way Purelake still maintain on their own website that the Greyhound will be a Gastropub. And they also state they have a good relationship with Local Authorities, . . . . Hmmmm.

http://www.purelake.co.uk/projects.php? ... ject_id=62

I work very closely with Developers, some of whom occasionally like to sail close to the wind with Local Authorities. In my 15 years in the industry, I have never come across such a developer who fails to communicate their actions to the Regulators (i.e. tearing down a building in a conservation area). And the reason I don't give my actual name on STF, is that i have to work with developers to earn my crust. With regards to the Greyhound, I am voicing a personal and professional opinion, which would turn clients away. Though in saying this, I have turned down work from developers who i do not consider have an ethical approach. Purelake have made themselves one such company. It takes ages to build a good reputation, and one wrong decision can totally destroy it.

[Pat Trembath]

Sorry, Simon, but you have missed out one stage.

Milford put in an application for 70 flats, which included the demolition of the Greyhound. The only time Sydenham Society met with Milfords we argued strongly against their plans and told them we would be objecting strongly to these, if submitted. Milfords, as far as I know, had liquidity problems and sold the Greyhound site on to Wealdfrost.

In the meanwhile Lewisham locally listed the pub and created the Cobbs Corner Conservation Area

Wealdfrost, knowing the pub would be retained within the new Conservation Area, in August 2008 invited the Sydenham Society to meet with 6a Architects and dp9 to discuss their designs for the 49 flats/Greyhound development.

Also present at the meeting were Tim Lund, the then chair of the Sydenham Society, other members of the Society's Conservation and Planning Committee, along with representatives of Sydenham Traders and local councillors. Lewisham Planners had been talking to the architects since January and this was an informal pre-application meeting to see what representatives of the local community thought about their ideas. We thought the plans imaginative but considered there were too many flats and the buildings were too high and made comments to this effect. In the end the height and the number of flats was reduced.

If you read this in conjunction with the quote from the website you will realise that the Sydenham Society at no time worked in partnership with the developers.

[Eagle]

Thanks Pat
So the fault is entirely with our council , which is a one party state.

The builders should be told to rebuild the Greyhound as it was and no change of planning permission will be granted following their illegal demolition.

[Annie.]

They won't do that Eagle, the council say yes to anything now,The Greyhound might as well be knocked down,it looks odd,standing there a shell of itself,at the moment at least it looks like a reproduction Greyhound,original features gone,unless they do a brilliant job on doing it all up,I just cant visualise it at the moment.

[ Post made via Mobile Device ]

[Tim Lund]

Also present at the meeting were Tim Lund, the then chair of the Sydenham Society, other members of the Society's Conservation and Planning Committee, along with representatives of Sydenham Traders and local councillors. Lewisham Planners had been talking to the architects since January and this was an informal pre-application meeting to see what representatives of the local community thought about their ideas. We thought the plans imaginative but considered there were too many flats and the buildings were too high and made comments to this effect. In the end the height and the number of flats was reduced.

True - but is it true enough? We did indeed object successfully to an additional storey, but were we really competent to approve the imagination of the designs? I don't have notes, but that may have been the meeting where I was excited by the idea of green roofs - an idea which was later dropped.

Was that the sort of thing the developers cynically threw in at that stage to get our buy-in? Did they expect to reduce the height anyway, following the standard negotiating approach of starting high, but being flexible? So they gave some ground to our objections, and we were able to claim we'd done our bit for the community, but were we not just being played with?

And on what basis were we selected as representatives of the local community? At the time, Simono was trying to organise a petition to oppose this - see here - and from the personal email address given there, it is possible, with some googling, to realise that Simono probably had rather more relevant experience than us in matters to do with social housing.

[marymck]

And on what basis were we selected as representatives of the local community?

I don't know Tim, but as you were Chair at the time, do you know?

[Annie.]

At the end of the day,it was down to the planning officers, Local MPs,etc, i'm sure you both did what you thought best at the time,and I for one am grateful for all the work you both do/did for Sydenham.

[ Post made via Mobile Device ]

[Tim Lund]

And on what basis were we selected as representatives of the local community?

I don't know Tim, but as you were Chair at the time, do you know?

As I wrote, I don't think I had much of a clue at the time what was going on - I just assumed Pat did

[Annie.]

I passed the pub earlier,2/3 builders busy working on it,
It will be interesting to see the outcome.

[ Post made via Mobile Device ]

[Weeble]

Wow, this thread is turning to a Sydenham version of the Leveson Inquiry!

If you'll forgive me returning to the subject of the future of the Greyhound, as oppose to how we got where we are:

I've had a scan of the plans. The good news seems to be that having to take the Greyhound to pieces and rebuild is that the basement has been extended and now forms a more functional part of the building - kitchen and toilets which were on the first floor are now in the basement, and appear to be larger. There is a dumb waiter from basement to ground floor which will be very useful (hard to tell whether this existed in the original plans or could have been introduced - food service would have been challenging otherwise!). If the conservatory is completed to a high standard, it could be a pleasing addition.

In reconfiguring the pub over basement, ground and conservatory there appears to be an overall loss in 'public' floorspace (ie less space for paying customers to sit) but having it all on a single floor might be more manageable, but there is no potential for function rooms.

My big question is: there's supposedly someone lined up to take the pub on. Who is it? Have they been involved in these plans? What do they think of them? Would they prefer to have the first floor given over to the pub in addition to the ground floor/basement/conservatory.

If we knew that there was a committed pub operator involved in the planning stage I'd be a lot more comfortable with the plans.

In defence of Purelake squeezing a couple of flats into the plans: rebuilding the Greyhound is a pretty big undertaking, introducing a great deal of unplanned expense plus all the cashflow issues of a development which is now about a year behind schedule - I wouldn't be surprised if the sale of two extra flats doesn't even cover their costs.

I'm not concerned in principle about having flats over the pub. Top of my agenda are making sure we get the Greyhound building completed to a high standard and operating as a great pub that is viable for the long term - if the flats help ensure we get this, great.

[marymck]

And on what basis were we selected as representatives of the local community?

I don't know Tim, but as you were Chair at the time, do you know?

As I wrote, I don't think I had much of a clue at the time what was going on - I just assumed Pat did

I wasn't asking about the detail about what was going on. This was a big complex project.

But you asked the question: "on what basis were we selected as representatives of the local community?" By we I assume you meant the Sydenham Society of which you were Chair.

I'm sure your sniping at Syd Soc - and what I consider personally to be snide remarks aimed at Pat, who has done more for this community than anyone else I can think of - is proving a great comfort to Purelake.

[simon]

Cllr Liam Curran piles the pressure on Purelake:
http://www.newsshopper.co.uk/news/97936 ... emolition/

[biscuitman1978]

My big question is: there's supposedly someone lined up to take the pub on. Who is it? Have they been involved in these plans? What do they think of them? Would they prefer to have the first floor given over to the pub in addition to the ground floor/basement/conservatory.

The Planning Statement submitted in support of the planning application says at paragraph 6.6:

As demonstrated by the attached marketing report, the property has been marketed since May 2011 for use as a coffee shop, restaurant / café, bookmakers and convenience store. There has been some interest from 2 independent pub chain operators but neither opted to progress discussions due to concerns on the split level arrangement and restricted ceiling heights in the cellar (1.6m). Otherwise there has been a single firm offer to use the site as a betting shop. Such a change of use would require planning permission and is not supported by the development plan.

I have asked the planning officer dealing with the application whether the marketing report can be made public. It's not on the Council's website, but it may have been withheld because it contains commercially sensitive information.

I'm not sure why the Planning Statement says that change of use to a betting shop would require planning permission, as the change of use from a pub (A4 use) to betting shop (A2 use) is usually 'permitted development', i.e. you have the right to change from A4 to A2 without permission. I've asked the planning officer whether he is aware of any conditions attached to the previous permission, or any 'Article 4 Directions', which might have withdrawn that right.

[JeeBee]

Isn't residences over a pub a rather standard feature, a place for the landlord to live - also that helps with insurance. If the place goes as a pub, I bet a flat will go with it.

Losing first floor drinking area and toilet is a shame, but the new basement loos will be up to date at least. Kitchen space is also very good to see, as is the beer store and access - it shows the place will be configured for a pub, if not now then in the future.

The conservatory will be usable all year, and is a darn site nicer to be in, than to be outside by that roundabout. It's also good that it increasing the floor area, and creates a separate 'room', of sorts.

[Eagle]

Betting Shop God forbid.

I would rather it was pulled down.

Mary , although you appear to know quite a bit about this , not sure it does any good having a go at another member , who I am sure has as is doing their best for Sydenham.