Harringay, Haringey - So Good they Spelt it Twice!
Big new TfL Substation to be built on Green Lanes - but community voice silenced
Today's planning list shows that the space in front of the Piccadilly Line ventilation shat building is to be used for the construction of a new electricity substation.
I do not object to that but it is very odd that the application is being made as a certificate of lawfulness rather than as a planning application. This means that the public has no right to comment.
I oppose the way it is being handled for a number of reasons. I explained this to the responsible planning officer Anna Anderson (anna.anderson@haringey.gov.uk) in an email I sent to her today. I copied in one of our new councillors, Jo Kuper. I have also spoken with Ian Sygrave at the Ladder Community Safety Partnership who has said that he will raise it at this week's meeting and also write to Anna Anderson.
My email is reproduced below. Any resident can write to Anna about this matter, despite the attempt to cut out community involvement. The decision date is due to be 26th August.
Dear Anna,
Re: Planning Submission for Colina Road site (HGY/2026/1854)
I am a resident of the Harringay Ladder.
Today I noticed the above reference application. It is for a significant building which covers a good part of of the part of a plot that has been unbuilt on for almost 100 years.
I see that is had been made as an application for a certificate of Lawfulness. Can I ask why Haringey has agreed to handle this application this way rather than as a full application?
The site is a significant and prominent one which for that reason alone ought to be open to community scrutiny.
There are two aspects in particular which concern me.
1. The level of noise for nearby properties already flagged in the application,
2. The impact on visual amenity in this prominent site. This is not addressed at all in the application and there are no visuals to suggest that visual amenity has been taken into account.
In HGY/2016/1807, the applicant for 590-598 Green Lanes London N8 0RA (which you should note includes this site), made a specific reference in his application to the site in front of the ventilation shaft building that is the site for HGY/2026/1854. The 2016 application specified:
"..we are proposing to create a 'Pocket Space' on the corner of Green Lanes and Colina Mews. This space will be partly used for a few parking spaces allocated to the NHS facility, but the rest of the space during the week and the entire space at weekends could be used for a community led activity such as a pop-up cafe."
They included the following diagram.
This site therefore has a very recent planning history and I assume since the front of the 590-592 plot was not excepted from the decision its use as a pocket park was also given planning approval.
This makes it even more odd that the current matter is being handled under a certificate of lawfulness.
Yours sincerely,
Hugh
Replies to This Discussion
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Permalink Reply by Anna Abela
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Hi Rob,
Thanks for raising these questions.
I can answer one of them, as I was asked by the Evergreen Development residents to advocate for them with Clarion and TfL executives when I was a Labour local councillor (2022-2026).
The timing of the removal of the hoarding is not linked to TfL's planning application. The hoarding was taken down by Clarion after I asked for this to be done in two meetings I convened with Clarion's executives and in a letter I sent to Clarion's CEO Clare Miller. If memory serves me well, the hoarding was taken down shortly after I received a reply from Clare Miller's Chief of Staff. I took this initiative because the residents who live in the Evergreen Development felt the hoarding was unsightly.
Hope that's helpful context.
Best,
Anna
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Admin for testingPermalink Reply by Hugh -
Thanks for this very helpful reply, Rob. Ian has agreed to include this item in tonight‘s LCSP meeting. Unfortunately, I can’t be there, but if you’re able to attend, I’m sure your contributions would be helpful.
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Permalink Reply by Clive Carter
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Hugh, I attended last night's LCSP AGM and this subject was aired there. I'm not familiar with this matter and did not comment. However the meeting heard criticism from several quarters about the performance of personnel in the council's Planning Department.
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Permalink Reply by Nigel
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Hi,
As an ordinary homeowner on the Ladder, I am entirely in favour of any and all improvements to the Piccadilly line service. However, I must say this scheme looked rum to me. Is TFL trying to avoid the delays and strictures of proper planning control? It is an ugly proposal, which, if properly planned, could provide both what TFL wants and a better corner for Green Lanes.
So, prompted by Robert Pike's point 2 and Zena's note, I had a quick look at the documents on the Haringey Planning Portal with a view to the question of whether this site is or could reasonably be decided by the Council to be a "development by [a] railway undertaker on [its] operational land" per Class A of Part 8 of Sch2 to the GDPO 2015 as the TFL submission claims, so that it may be entitled to a Certificate of Lawfulness under s.192(1) of the TCP Act 1990, which would enable it to develop for operational purposes outside the usual planning regime.
Assuming that the land is TFL's, the short answer still seems to be "probably not", contrary to the view of the Council's planner Anna Anderson in her reply to Hugh below. The documents and the planning history do not support such a conclusion.
The key is that this is a question of fact which does not depend on ownership alone but also on use, helpfully also evidenced by permitted use.
The HOL responses below indicate that this particular site actually has not been used by TFL or its predecessors for operational purposes for many years, at least since the ventilation shaft was completed, if at all. It is not, at the date it seeks to establish lawfulness, in such use by TFL.
On permitted development and use, the documents on the Portal show that the current, prevailing planning permission for this particular site is as part of the "new development" of 590-598 Green Lanes, the land to the north and west granted under HGY/2016/1807. The permitted use of this particular site then granted was for car parking and landscaping in connection with that development.
In 2021, when TFL indicated it wanted to "take back" this particular site, as shown on its application documents, it obtained permission to remove those user restrictions: HGY/2021/3583.
So far, the CPLUD Supporting Statement for the current application is correct [at paras 4.3 and 4.5 on pp7 and 8 - there seems to be no para 4.4].
But HGY/2021/3583 was obtained by and granted to TFL as a non-material change in the description of development - ie the development permitted under the 2016 permission: see the permission and documents on the Portal for that application. Page 2 of the Savills' covering letter filed in support expressly confirms this:
"Planning Considerations
The Finney Judgement ruling prevents a change in the description of development when making minor material amendments to an application under Section 73 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990 (as
amended). The current description for application reference HGY/2016/1807 is overly restrictive and restricts
minor amendments and design development to the approved proposals at 590 – 598 Green Lanes.
A change to the description of development can be permitted so long as the change proposed is ‘non-material’.
The Planning Practice Guidance confirms that there is no statutory definition of non-material. “This is because
it will be dependent on the context of the overall scheme – an amendment that is not material in one context
may be material in another.” In this instance the application is merely seeking to amend the description of
development of the outline permission allowing for greater flexibility for future design work. As a result, no
changes are actually proposed to the approved scheme. The amendment to the description is therefore clearly
non-material." [emphasis added]TFL was therefore only granted permission for uses which (1) would not change the approved scheme for 590-598 Green Lanes and this adjoining site, and (2) required only design changes.
Paragraph 4.6 of TFL's CPLUD Supporting Statement for its current Certificate of Lawfulness application may be correct in stating that the planning permission to use the land as a car park for the new development was "never implemented". But it is quite wrong to say that " Therefore the land remains associated with the function of the Piccadilly Line". It is not. It is part of the non-railway development permitted at 590-598 Green Lanes.
Likewise the claim in paragraph 6.3 of the Statement and the Conclusion at para 8.1 that the "development proposed on the land adjoining the ventilation shaft head house would be lawful as per Class A Part 8 of Schedule 2 to the GDPO."
If I am right, TFL cannot claim lawfulness for a development and railway use on this site without obtaining planning permission. It cannot pretend that the site is currently in railway operational use, for which Class A is designed, when it is not. That would not be lawful. In order now to develop on that site and to put it to operational railway use, TFL must obtain planning permission.
The Council's planners and Monitoring Officer will wish to ensure that the Council does not act unlawfully.
All IMHO, of course. Readers and the LCSP have my permission to use this in any comments they may wish to make on the application. I gave up trying to file it online!
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The Council's planners and Monitoring Officer will wish to ensure that the Council does not act unlawfully.
———
Indeed.
In this and similar regards, I was pleased to see—as one of the last acts of the Starmer Government—that Parliament passed a bill that will impose a Duty of Candour on local and national government.
While this duty has—I understand—long applied to the NHS, it probably did not apply to employees in Local Government.
After this Bill receives Royal Assent, it should require even more honesty on the part of employees of Haringey Council.
I hope the Monitoring Officer will impress this on staff.
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Permalink Reply by Alan Stanton
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Thanks, Clive for adding a focus on the application of the excellent "duty of candour".
It was the last century when I worked as a lower level employe in a local Council. ( Elsewhere in London.) But I was also then well aware that some of my staff colleagues avoided "rocking the boat". Neither could they always be candid. At the time they had mortgages to pay and families to worry about. While I didn't have those responsibilities.
I also I knew I had the backing of my Trades Union. Plus some decent and principled bosses. So speaking truth was far less risky.
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Admin for testingPermalink Reply by Hugh -
Thank you, Nigel, for this very helpful reply
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Sorry it's so long for 2 simple points. Sent a version to Anderson, Alderman and councillors.
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Permalink Reply by Chris Barker
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All this legalese does not hide the fact that, if a new ventilation shaft is needed for the Piccadilly line in this area, it has to be above the line. If it is not to be in this area is there another area where you would like it to be?
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Permalink Reply by Rory
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Having read the thread, Chris, I'm going to say somewhere more appropriate and/or subject to public scrutiny. The worry as laid out in this thread is that TfL have approached this issue in a way that they can plan and act outside of public scrutiny or approval. We are against that thing. (I don't think we're engineering experts versed in placement of underground ventilation shafts, but we do have an interest in work that might impact the enjoyment of our local area being done outside of our scrutiny.) Do you have any suggestions where this ventilation shaft could be placed? Maybe you can write to the council with your thoughts...
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Admin for testingPermalink Reply by Hugh -
Chris, I and others have made it clear that we're not 'against' this plan. In fact it's in all our interests that it goes ahead. (By the way, it's not a new ventilation shaft being proposed: as I said in my initial post it's a new electricity substation).
The issue is that the plans need to be subject to public scrutiny. It may be that challenging the plans could help find a solution that somewhat insulates the neighbouring properties from the noted vibration and provides a structure that is not an eyesore to us all. (Did you know that the occupants of the Evergreen building who face the air shaft are already inconvenienced by it, in that iy quietly send out soot which would otherwise settle in their flats - though quite how this was missed at the plannning stage in 1016 is a mystery to me.)
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Chris, if there is an engineering case for a new electricity substation, then let's hear it!
At the LCSP meeting last evening, we heard that (a) when at the Planning stage a few years ago, TfL raised little or no objection and that (b) when Approved, the provision for a Pocket Park was a formal Condition of Planning Approval.
There appear to have been slip-ups by TfL and by the Planning Dept.
The Planning Enforcement Team may be smaller than the figure of 6 (six) that I remember from a several years ago. That was six, for the whole Borough.
Developers—some of which the council has been too cosy with—appreciate that this is a chronically weak area.
IMO, one Planning Enforcement staff member for each of the Borough's 21 Wards would not be excessive.
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