Housing report 2024 - part one

Future Cities Forum's discussion took place in a newly created space designed by Wright & Wright Architects.

Future Cities Forum was hosted by the Museum of the Home for 'Housing 2024' discussion event this autumn and was joined by local authorities, investors, developers and architects to draw conclusions on what the UK government needs to do to solve the housing crisis.

In part one of this Housing Report 2024, we feature the contributions of Museum of the Home, Director: Creative Programmes and Collections, Danielle Patten, Wright & Wright architect, Leanna Boxhill, Hackney Council's Deputy Mayor for Housing supply, planning, culture and inclusive economy, Cllr Guy Nicholson, Sutton Council's Chair of Housing, Economy and Business Committee, Cllr Jake Short, Southwark Council's Head of Sustainable Growth, Neil Kirby, Transport for London's Head of Growth and Masterplanning, David Christie, Peabody's Executive Director for Thamesmead, John Lewis and LDA Design's Associate, Nicholas Bigelow.

Danielle Patten gave an introduction to the re-development of the museum which was carried out by Wright & Wright Architects. Danielle explained that the re-development took place so that the original Georgian almshouses could be used in different and more flexible ways for the community. Work was carried out to create a learning pavilion and open up the garden spaces. Danielle said that many local families do not have access to green space, so those at the museum are very important to them. The learning pavilion has been used as a food bank and there is also a sensory den for families to 'hang out in'. The original name - Geffrey Museum - Danielle stated was difficult as an approach and the museum wanted a more appropriate name where visitors knew they were welcome to come in and join in the debate about what 'home' means to different people.

Wright & Wright architect Leanna Boxhill described how working on historic buildings can have challenges. She said there had been many adaptations over the years but one of the important issues was making the building stable. The tying together of different buildings was also important she insisted. The pub on the corner has been brought in to expand the dining facilities so it had to link correctly to the museum but also retain the character of the pub which local families had been used to and treasured. Ultimately she explained, all buildings are living and the spaces needed to be designed in a flexible way to adapt to the changing programme of the museum.

Image: courtesy of Wright & Wright Architects/ Hufton + Crow

The debate then opened up with Guy Nicholson, Deputy Mayor for housing supply, planning, culture and inclusive economy at Hackney Council who was asked about the pressure to create more housing under the new Labour government. Guy described the situation for housing supply in the borough:

'The issue isn't a broken planning system let me say, the pipeline is there but there are profound issues in the Capital, which are contributing to the interruption of delivery. One problem is access to capital, the other is the consumer or the market. I think we have all been affected by the cost of living crisis and that has had an impact on development and the circular movement of capital in the system. There are problems around land value and infrastructure and of course creating place is very important as is the cultural offer.

'All of this comes back to the fact as a council the decision has been taken to be a social landlord. Hackney Council is the second largest council acting as a social landlord in the country with 22,000 homes in its ownership. This commitment as a social landlord is ongoing and for the supply of new homes, the council has just embarked on a new relationship with a major construction company in the order of 245 million pounds. There is some public grant in there but it is negligible. So we have to use the capital resources of the council for this. Some houses will be for sale, some for shared ownership and about 400 will be affordable. There are less than this number for social rent. Our housing waiting list is eye watering and our temporary accommodation demands is tipping the balance sheet. Hackney is not exceptional in this.

'The current government has a problem. That's with the supply of capital. What representation do we need to make collectively over this? The Prime Minister has made it clear there will be no more capital, no flow of grant that will meet this challenge. It is also not just about building new homes, it is everything else that goes with it. Can something be done about pension pots? On energy and retrofit, lots of colleagues have spent lots of time trying to square the circle. We need one to two billion pounds to retrofit homes. Should the council start borrowing? There has been a naivete through all of us with greening of our homes, and that is that it is not just another layer of say putting in some double glazing and then wondering why all the damp and mould comes in, it is about seeing green energy as central to maintaining a decent home in today's standards. There are tens of thousands of social homes across the Capital that should be made fit to live in. It requires bringing in a different approach and producing a new financial model.

'Across all of our estates we need design principles and these are about place and quality of our homes. When I say everything should be built like the Barbican, I do not mean in the Brutalist style. You can have any style you like, but there must be standards of build, private and public outdoor space. This is the vision of today's/tomorrow's inner city. The market needs to be able to do that. Let's not stack them high, but if you do, make sure you have that quality of a decent home in a thriving environment. King's Cross and the Olympic Park prove we can do it, with quality and character, but how do we bring forward the metrics? The old model will not work.'

There has been positive news on the greening however of council-owned buildings this month. The council reports that twenty seven Hackney Council buildings are set to have their emissions and heating bills slashed over the next two years as new environmentally friendly heat pumps are installed. The projects were made possible after two successful bids to the Government’s Public Sector Decarbonisation Fund, and will see new heat pumps installed at London Fields Lido, Homerton Library, Stoke Newington Town Hall and Library, Hackney Service Centre, Hackney Town Hall and many more locations. 

Heat pumps provide heating by capturing heat from the air or ground, and converting this into energy that can heat water.

It’s thought the new energy efficiency measures will save 3,300 tonnes of carbon dioxide equivalent each year, while reducing energy bills for the Council, libraries and schools as they face increasing financial pressures. 

Above: new housing in Hackney (Courtesy London Borough of Hackney)

The discussion included comparative comment from another borough on housing and connecting infrastructure. Cllr Jake short, Chair of the Housing, Economy and Business Committee, at Sutton Council, was asked about the significant problem of homelessness in the borough, but also the success of a new cultural quarter. Cllr Short said:

'Sutton is on a unique place, we have lots of trains and buses that work really well compared to other areas of London but we do not have a tube station, so some might say it is really is lagging behind. We can see the development at scale at Sutton town centre with regular buses and trains and that means that our housing and regeneration projects have focussed on the centre, with a shift away from cars. The number of car is very high generally in the borough but we have managed with the transport to keep the numbers down in the town centre,

'The number of homes we are building is quite staggering, some 2,500 homes over next five years, and these are in the centre. This is a planned move. We are keeping the highest density in the town centre to protect the more suburban areas. Residents do not like it but we have to have open conversations with them and suggest that if they want to keep their leafy roads in Carshalton, then density has to happen in the centre. With our development partner we are confident that we are building homes to last. Over the last 22 years, we have always hit our housing targets because we intend to deliver. If the government want to adjust the numbers, they do need to listen to us.

'The council also has a role as place-shapers and the pedestrian town centre has buildings that the council own or have earmarked to buy. As we take ownership very seriously we have been successful with the future high streets fund and we have been able to go to government and point out the buildings we own and our social and cultural offer that we have in mind. For instance, there was a former bank building in the high street that we have been able to buy and turn into offices for community groups. We have been able to build the Throwley cultural centre which has been very successful.

Above: CGI of proposed Civic Hub in Sutton (courtesy GenR8 Kajima Regeneration Ltd / LB Sutton)

Sutton Council has this month announced its preferred development partner for the next exciting phase of its town centre regeneration. The plans for the St Nicholas Shopping Centre, Civic Offices, Gibson Road car park and Secombe Theatre sites will see a brand new Civic Hub open in the heart of the town centre. The Hub will offer residents a new ‘front door’ to access services from the Council and its partners right on the high street, as well as a new library and community spaces. The proposed Civic Hub should be completed by mid-2029.

Around 740 new homes - 50% of which will be affordable housing for local families, including nearly 300 homes for social rent - will be built on the existing Civic Offices, Gibson Road car park and Secombe Theatre sites. There will also be improvements to the public realm, such as new ways to access the town centre.

The new retail space will provide opportunities for both existing and new businesses, as well as a range of new leisure facilities. This new mix of activities will provide Sutton residents and visitors a totally new experience and strengthen the local economy. 

The decision follows the successful recent openings of Oru Sutton and Throwley Yard, the plans for a new home on the High Street for Sutton College, as well as the construction of new council homes at Beech Tree Place and Elm Grove in the town centre.

Image: courtesy of British Land, showing the development of Paper Yard, modular buildings designed for prospective life sciences companies. British Land is developing housing, workspace and cultural venues in Canada Water with Southwark Council.

In September this year, at an event held in Westminster, a cross-party coalition of over 100 council landlords, led by Southwark Council, jointly published five solutions for the government to ‘secure the future of England’s council housing (PDF, 4.1 MB)’.

The report, led by Southwark Council with contributions from housing policy experts Toby Lloyd and Rose Grayston, set out a full roadmap to renew council housing over the next decade and critical policy changes for the realisation of the new government’s social housing ambitions. They warned that unless more is done soon, most council landlords will struggle to maintain their existing homes adequately or meet the huge new demands to improve them, let alone build new homes for social rent.

The recommendations include urgent action to restore lost income and unlock local authority capacity to work with the new government to deliver its promises for new, affordable homes throughout the country.

The five solutions set out detailed and practical recommendations to the new government:

1. A new fair and sustainable HRA model – including an urgent £644 million one-off rescue injection, and long-term, certain rent and debt agreements

2. Reforms to unsustainable Right to Buy policies

3. Removing red tape on existing funding

4. A new, long-term Green & Decent Homes Programme

5. Urgent action to restart stalled building projects, avoiding the loss of construction sector capacity and a market downturn

   
   

Southwark Council's Head of Sustainable Growth, Neil Kirby, answered a question about the need for masterplanning of new homes in the borough and the avoidance of 'chopping and changing' on schemes through constant review:

'On larger housing schemes such as the one at Canada Water you need a masterplan. Its a 15-year scheme. But the masterplans do need to be flexible. The council needs to review every now and again, time moves on and you need people who have been at the council some time, with a history of the borough to help make appropriate decisions. We need to be open for discussion but have clear lines on design and sustainability.

'It is really about what is important in the area. We need to move from retail sheds to something else. On joined up connectivity the Bakerloo Line will come, maybe in 20 to 30 years time, but it will come. Meanwhile fifty-storey towers are going up. We need entrepreneurs with cash.

'As I said infrastructure takes a lot of time and we are focussed on sustainable housing and the private sector is helping us with that, like British Land in Canada Water. A few years ago, Peckham was the tenth poorest neighbourhood in the world. Now we are trying to find a balance between improving peoples' housing and gentrification.

'One way we are maintaining existing culture in the borough is through schemes like the hub we have built for Afro-Caribbean hairdressers, who have lived in the borough for thirty years. The council has spent a lot of money doing this and we will probably never make any money out of it, but we are determined to make something out of our existing culture.

'We are not worried about other cultural districts such as Stratford taking over as cultural hotspots, we have enough existing culture in the borough with for instance the Camberwell Schools of Art. Artists benefit from cheap subsidised studio space and we are trying to develop them to grow.'

Transport for London (TfL) wants to develop housing around transport infrastructure, and is preparing to present a strong business case for the extension of the DLR to Thamesmead. Above image: TfL's transport interchange at Canada Water, with British Land residential development in the background and new lagoon bridge design on left .

Transport for London's Head of Growth and Master-planning, David Christie, joined the conversation to talk about the business case for the extension of the DLR - a spur from the Beckton branch line - down to Thamesmead and Abbey Wood:

'At TfL, the provision of housing has massively increased up the agenda with what we are trying to do. However, there has been restricted capital post Covid to carry out our ambitions, so we need long term funding from the UK government. The extension of the DLR has become the Mayor of London's number one project, but it requires collaboration between the public and private sectors

'If we can get alignment with partners, our vision is that the extension would support 25 thousand homes and 10,000 jobs as a by product. If the funding was found, the project could be delivered by 2032, but it needs commitment from the government. We expect to present our outline business case in Spring 2025. We need funding mechanisms that can unlock homes, but the extension could bring people from Thamesmead back into London.'

TfL has been working together with the Royal Borough of Greenwich, the London Borough of Newham and the Greater London Authority (GLA), as well as landowners Peabody, Lendlease, abrdn, St William (Berkeley Homes) and Homes England to support the delivery of new homes, improved town centres and better access to jobs within and from Beckton Riverside and Thamesmead.

The proposed DLR extension from Gallions Reach to Thamesmead via Beckton Riverside would connect two Opportunity Areas and four development sites. A new DLR station would be built at Beckton Riverside, with a tunnel built under the River Thames linked to another new DLR station at Thamesmead. It would build on experience from 2009 when the DLR was extended to Woolwich Arsenal, tunnelling beneath the River Thames, with housing growth following in areas including Woolwich, Canning Town, and the Royal Docks.

TfL is also introducing 54 new trains ,with 33 replacing the oldest trains in the current DLR fleet and the remainder used to boost capacity and meet growing demand across the DLR network. These will be introduced from 2024, with the whole fleet in place by 2026. TfL explored a number of other transport options including increasing the number and frequency of bus services in Thamesmead and Beckton Riverside, without a new rail service. Although this would improve links to local town centres and the rail network, this option alone would not provide the level of connectivity or capacity needed to enable the 25,000 - 30,000 planned new homes in the area.

A brand-new Superloop route, the SL3, will also be introduced between Thamesmead and Bromley by spring this year and is part of a network of express routes in outer London connecting town centres, hospitals, schools and transport hubs and is a key part of the Mayor's commitment to improving the bus network in outer London. There are also wider proposals for upgrading existing DLR stations to cope with additional demand expected over the coming years.

John Lewis, Executive Director, Peabody spoke at the discussion on the importance of the place-based approach:

'When you take a whole place-based approach, infrastructure is absolutely key. SE28 has no form of trains and that for me says it all. Without the DLR extension I believe any housing project would just slide into piecemeal development. The extension would definitely release homes and the great thing about it is that it gets the train line under the river and then allows it to continue to extend over the long term.

'It was only about five years ago that this project was in the Mayor of London's portfolio and at that time it was tenth on the list. TfL wanted to stick to buses but Peabody felt that would end up with a messy suburban solution. So we said we will start with a strategic plan along with Lendlease and we will have the mindset that the DLR is coming. We also said to Greenwich Council that we were not prepared to do 'piecemeal'. We have a very strong delivery board now and frankly that has happened because of Peabody. Now the question is who is going to pay for it?

'In terms of where housing design is going in the UK, there are some very good designs in urban and dense areas but some more tragic examples in the suburban setting. Some house builders have got away with the lowest level of housing. I live in Milton Keynes and I look at large scale delivery. The body that built housing in Milton Keynes originally was later disbanded and then came in the nasty cheap homes. There were some good houses being built ten years ago but only because they had a battering ram.'

Image: 'Living in the landscape' at Thamesmead, courtesy of LDA Design

Place-making has been central to Peabody's approach in its housing building strategy and has worked closely with LDA Design to achieve high standards. Nicholas Bigelow, Associate at LDA Design, explained that place making is about creating places where a community belongs:

'Good place-making needs an active and connected approach and plays an important role in large complex projects. It is not a passive approach to landscaping.

'It is important to connect doorsteps to infrastructure and it's about thinking forward. Getting infrastructure in early creates space for biodiversity. At Thamesmead there is existing blue and green infrastructure but it needs lifting up to the next level.

'It's also about responding to climate change and giving place-making a more strategic importance in tackling that. Place-making can also bring people together, it is the medium with differing views amongst a community, to create unity.

Nick was asked a question about whether the 'Building Beautiful' concept needs to be actively still considered in place-making?

'Where there is anti-social behaviour that might spoil a place, passive surveillance is critical. We know how to do that. But I do go back to the need for a more joined-up approach and thinking hard about how we approach the entrances to our buildings and homes and the public realm is so important in that curation.'

Peabody and LDA Design launched ‘Living in the Landscape’ in 2020 as a blueprint for how natural systems can change lives for the better in Thamesmead, London. It will ensure landscape is central to the town’s recovery as housing or transport. The report set out an ambitious programme to ensure Thamesmead is more biodiverse, sociable, healthier and inclusive. It supports the desire of Peabody, one of London’s largest and oldest housing associations, to put the vulnerable first and co-design change with residents.

LDA Design explained:

'For the Greater London Council, reclaiming the marshy eastern reaches of the River Thames for a New Town was an opportunity to create a modernist utopia for 60,000 people. In this vision, concrete and modern amenities went hand in hand with unrivalled green space and waterways. Londoners chose the name Thamesmead, a place where the land and the river are valued equally.

'In the end, Thamesmead experienced decades of shortfall in investment. Development has since been piecemeal and ad hoc with housing turning its back on the waterways. Even though Thamesmead is home to 45,000 people, it can feel empty. Many people are living on low incomes and in poor health, and the town was designed for the car and not for active travel.

'Peabody is planning major changes that will see the town double in size by 2050. Their vision for recovery will create new destinations and attractive public realm so the place will feel busy and safe, and lives can start to overlap. Thamesmead’s landscape will be made to work hard, providing flood protection, richer biodiversity, play, trails and leisure. New jobs will come through green industries and social enterprise such as food growing and urban farming.

'Focus will be on restoring Thamesmead’s fractured relationship with the Thames, as well as its extraordinary lakes and canals. The Framework rests on six tenets: that Thamesmead will be a place of choices; that life is close to nature; that connectivity will be a gamechanger; that, here, inclusion counts for a great deal; that Thamesmead will be resilient to climate breakdown; and well managed and cared for. Five programmes of change focusing on water, biodiversity, activity, a productive landscape and improved connectivity work together to harness Thamesmead’s natural systems. The Thamesmead Test will measure new development and ensure it is never generic.

'The Framework is supported by a Biodiversity Action Plan that will make Thamesmead one of the most biodiverse areas in London, prioritising black poplar, pollinators, European eel and water voles. ‘Living in the Landscape’ also contributes to wider strategic goals such as flood protection, the Thames 2100 plan, Bexley and Greenwich GI strategies, and sport and recreation provision.

'Led by LDA Design, ‘Living in the Landscape’ was developed with specialist support from Continuum Sport and Leisure, Gary Grant and Green Infrastructure Consultancy, David Withycombe and Land Management Services, architects Project Orange, engineers SNC-Lavalin Atkins and Vivid Economics.

Future Cities Forum would like to thank all its contributors to the first part of this report. The second part will be published shortly.

Below - and below: Future Cities Forum contributors embark on a tour of The Museum of the Home led by Danielle Patten - and Leanna Boxhill of Wright & Wright Architects describes the practice's work to expand the museum.