There's no space for affordable rent in Haringey's new high rise towers

Residential segregation in new high rise buildings

A survey of new twenty-plus storey residential towers on new developments in Haringey shows that none of them have any affordable or social rent homes at all.

It is a physical thing, they just do not want affordable renters around.

Public policy is to demolish council high rise, which provides council tenants with fabulous views, to build taller high rises from which all affordable tenants will be barred.

Please see the attached photographs of a typical summer dawn view, taken from a 10^th floor council high rise in Wood Green.

The seven new Haringey towers are on six separate developments.  

Five of the six developments are part of supposedly mixed-tenure schemes.   

Only two of the six developments have so far been built.

Developers and planners use a three-way segmentation on most new housing developments, so that market, intermediate and affordable renters have to use separate entrances.   These are known as poor doors.

But high rises usually have just one entrance.  It’s a big problem.  Developers strongly resist allowing affordable tenants to use the single entrance that these high towers normally provide.  

At the 33-storey Anthology Hale Works development at Tottenham Hale, this is explicit:  

‘As detailed within the description of the proposed development, the proposed tower is served by a single access core as a result of design constraints. As this has implications in terms of the potential management and maintenance of the units, Anthology proposes for all of the affordable housing units to be allocated as intermediate tenure.’

- JLL (Jones Lang LaSalle), Affordable Housing Viability Assessment, Anthology Hale Works, June 2017, p15.

Here are some details about the six schemes.

Spurs Ground

A cluster of four super-tall towers, 19, 19, 27 and 35 stories. HGY/2015/3000. 585 homes in total – 0% affordable.  Planning permission granted, Dec 2015 – not yet built.

Hale Wharf (Lock 17) 21 storeys

Phase one completed - now going to market in Hong Kong. Tenure segmented by block:  505 homes in total. The 21 storey block (141 homes) is all market sale.  A lower block (also in phase one, 108 homes) is all private rent. The lower blocks in phases 2 and 3 (256 homes) will contain affordable housing as well as more market homes.

One Station Square (22 Storeys) Station Road, London, N17 9JZ

(HGY/2016/3932) - Single tower, 128 residential units. Planning granted 10.08.2017. Of the proposed 128 residential units, 117 are Shared ownership intermediate units. The remaining 11 units will be market units. No affordable or low cost rent.

Tottenham Hale SW Plot – Anthology Hale Works – 33 storeys

Planning agreed – not yet built HGY/2017/2005 33 floors tower, 279 dwellings, 235 Market.   44 Intermediate dwellings on floors 1-4. 5^th floor is mixed, floors 6-32 are exclusively private. 

‘Given the site constraints which mean the tower is serviced by a single access core, Anthology is proposing all the affordable units are allocated as intermediate tenure and are occupied in accordance with LB Haringey’s affordability criteria. This assumes 50% of the affordable units are occupied by those with household incomes between £30,000pa and £40,000pa, with the remaining 50% of the affordable units occupied by those with household incomes between £40,000pa and the GLA maximum income (currently £90,000pa).’ (Viability Statement, p 25)

                            i.e., having only one entrance means no affordable renters…

Rivers Apartments, Cannon Road, N17

Rivers Apartments is a 22 storey tower (built 2014) alongside several lower blocks. HGY/2012/2128.  Report to planning sub committee on 28 January 2013 states,  The proposed dwelling mix is as follows: ƒ 100 shared ownership (or market) flats – in the tower;  122 rented units [in lower blocks] of which up to 92 will be at intermediate rents and 30 at social/affordable rents. The tower will consist solely of shared ownership units.

Apex House, 820 Seven Sisters Road, N15 5PQ

Under construction. HGY/2015/2915. One 23 storey, one 7 storey building, and 4 no. 3 storey townhouses. Planning Sub Committee 9 May 2016, Committee report states  at para 6.6.4, ‘The proposal provides for 59 affordable rented units located on the lower floors of the tower, and in the 7 storey block facing onto to Seven Sisters Road, and the townhouses set along Stonebridge Road.’

However, para 6.6.6 states baldly that ‘the tower at Apex House is Private Rented Accommodation’.

A clue as to the explanation comes from the notes of a Development Management Forum Meeting on 27/05/15.  When asked ‘Will Tottenham people be able to afford it?, Jonathan Kiddle of developers Grainger Plc replied, ‘they aim to provide for the ‘affordable gap’ between social rent and market rent.’ In other words, these are to be intermediate rather than Low Cost Rent.

The full tenure breakdown and accommodation schedule shows that the affordable rent throughout the scheme is described as intermediate housing.

Furthermore, the affordable/intermediate rent is to be provided by the Grainger Trust, a For Profit Registered Provider (FPRP) directly owned by the developer itself.  This is not “affordable rent” as laid out in housing policy, and unfettered direct nomination to these homes from the borough housing list would seem most unlikely.