PeckhamPlanningNetwork

See also

• Peckham Town Centre
• Planning
• Major developments
• Planning Applications Overall
• Planning Applications Individual
• Planning wider issues
• Transforming Central Rye Lane
• Old Kent Road

Page under construction

Introduction

The Peckham Planning Network (PPN) was made up of a number of individuals and groups, formed initially through the work in 2012/13 preparing for the PNAAP Public hearings, who worked together on planning matters in Peckham. Peckham Vision founded the PPN and facilitated it as a doorway into the planning issues affecting Peckham town centre. The PPN met bimonthly until July 2017. The Peckham Vision shop open two afternoons a week has become the drop in place to keep up to date and discuss planning and related matters. We have also held 5 Open Studio days in September and October to develop the means of making the planning information accessible. Information is now posted frequently on Peckham Vision Facebook and Twitter and in occasional emails. To join the mailing list, email info@peckhamvision.org. We are grateful to The Lane ward councillors for their support for this work with Community Council Neighbourhood Fund small grants to Peckham Vision's community planning project.

2017

17th July 2017 meeting

This was a joint meeting with the Southwark Planning Network. Minutes to be uploaded.

23rd March 2017 meeting

The meeting focussed on the Peckham Area Vision and 4 Peckham sites in the Council's consultation on the Preferred Option of the New Southwark Plan (NSP). Questions to clarify the proposals were discussed and issues that seemed to be raised were identified. The plans for the walk on 1st April were discussed. There was a discussion of topics that would be suitable for an open forum discussion at future meetings. This identified the following possible topics:

• Implications of local population growth for travel planning including vehicle parking.

• Cumulative effects on Peckham of the agreed additional housing (links to London Plan).

• Health issues related to housing growth including impact of housing density, less open space and the impact public health and well-being (a new Council remit).

• Is there a contradiction between gentrification and regeneration? Is the approach to demolition v reuse right?

• Open spaces, biodiversity and planning.

31st January 2017 meeting

The meeting reviewed the current and recent planning applications. There had been little chance to influence any of these once the consultation processes began. This compared with the greater ability to affect the plans for Central Rye Lane during the several years of PNAAP consultations. This was because community action had been organised and sustained over several years and been able to prepare more effectively for the planning processes. It was still important to track planning applications but the major issues now were probably the wider issues arising from the significant increase in the numbers of local residents, and the further developments arising from the New Southwark Plan (NSP) proposals for the ‘area vision’ and the issues for the four sites proposed for comprehensive redevelopment. The work to raise public awareness locally of the NSP proposals and the main issues now facing the town centre would need a lot of attention over the next 3 months, during the consultation ending on 28th April. The date for the next PPN meeting would be sometime in March/April depending on other public events for publicising the NSP.

2016

17th November 2016 meeting

The several major applications dealt with since the previous meeting were reviewed: ones approved: Mountview, Library Square, and Copeland Rd car park housing, those still awaiting decisions: two large housing developments in south Rye Lane, and major ones beginning – Aylesham Centre and the new Travel Lodge/Post office on the High St. There had been so many in the last year that it had been difficult for local people to organise comments and objections strongly enough to have an effect on the eventual decisions. The Aylesham Centre would become the major one to mobilise local engagement on. Several applications approved showed that the Conservation Area had little effect for example on restraining the creeping height increases. PPN was engaging in an email exchange with Cllr Mark Williams in charge of planning about this. The process for developing the New London Plan and the New Southwark Plan (NSP) were reviewed. The preparations for the consultation on the NSP in early 2017 were discussed. A Council review of the co-design process in Peckham had been completed and the publication of the report was awaited. The PPN Steering Group had now formed and meets bimonthly and handles the PPN work between PPN meetings. The next PPN meeting will be 31st January 2017.

26th September 2016 meeting

The meeting discussed the issues being raised by several applications and concluded:

• large advertising hoardings on Rye Lane pavement were a safety hazard, and inappropriate for the Conservation Area.
• considering the Mountview application separately from the application for the Library Square was very inadequate because of their close interaction and cumulative effects on the public realm.
• there were substantial cumulative negative effects of the high density and large mass of the cluster of adjacent housing developments at the south east side of Rye Lane.

The meeting also discussed the development of the PPN’s system for tracking and publicising information about planning applications, the outcome of the initial discussions with the Council about the wider issues raised by the many planning applications and the need to improve the planning procedures. There was discussion also about the Council’s review of the 'co-design' process, and the community preparations for the consultations on the New Southwark Plan and the London Plan. The PPN Core Group which had emerged several months before to help develop the PPN’s own processes had now developed its role and so had become the PPN Steering Group. The next PPN meeting is 17th November.

21st September 2016 Community Council Need for SPG

At the public meeting of the Peckham Townscape Heritage Inititive (THI) on 14th September the THI architect advised that we needed to seek an SPG (Supplementary Planning Guidance) to protect the character and nature of the Conservation Area, currently much threatened by approval of individual planing applications in and adjacent to the Conservation Area. So Derek Kinrade a PPN member asked this in Public Question time:

• I am a partner in the Peckham Townscape Heritage Initiative. At a meeting of the partnership on 14 September it emerged that despite the designation of Rye Lane as a Conservation Area in 2011, the Council has not developed any Supplementary Planning Guidance (SPG) to give teeth to this designation.  It is submitted that given the current tsunami of planning applications for the town centre there is an urgent need for an SPG. This is to ask whether this need has been conveyed to the relevant councillors, and what actions will be taken to ensure that effective planning guidance is developed?

Cllr Nick Dolezal chair of Planning Committee agreed to discuss this with officers and respond. The Southwark News published a letter from PPN on this on 22nd September (to be uploaded).

June/July 2016 Discussions with the Council

PPN representatives met with Cllr Nick Dolezal Planning Committee Chair and a Lane ward councillor to have a first discussion about some of the wider issues matters, with Cllr Mark Williams accompanied by Cllr Dolezal some weeks later, and with Dennis Sangweme the officer in charge of Development Control.

29th June 2016 Deputation to the Peckham & Nunhead Community Council

This deputation presented to the local councillors a summary of the wider issues and cumulative effects that PPN has been discovering. We suggested that some of them could usefully feature in the Community Council's forthcoming year’s meetings. Here is a copy of:

• the deputation speech delivered by Eileen Conn.
• a short paper handed to the councillors at the meeting.

6th June 2016 meeting

The meeting was attended by 20 people, and was another lively discussion. This time the focus was on numerous planning applications which needed comment and objections. Together they raised significant issues and had wider and cumulative effects on the town centre. These included the lack of social housing, damaging effects on the historic buildings and the Conservation Area, and the size and mass of some were out of scale with the town centre. Because of these wider issues, and that the plans were controversial, it was agreed to ask the ward councillors to call-in several so they could be decided by the Planning Committee, rather than by officers under delegated authority. People should be encouraged to submit their objections. It was also agreed to ask for a deputation to the Community Council on 29th June, and to consider making representations to the Planning Committee on 5th July about the wider issues and cumulative effects of so many planning applications being considered in isolation as separate developments. Other business included planning policy developments and future consultations, the development of PPN and the need for volunteers to help on the Peckham Vision stall at the Brimmington Park Festival on 2nd July and the Peckham Rye Fete on 3rd September. The next date is Monday 26th September. For info about this please email info@peckhamvision.org.

• 
• 
• 
• 

11th April 2016 meeting

The meeting was attended by 22 people, and 9 sent apologies. Almost all had been before, though at each meeting there are some new faces. In total about 45 people have now taken part in the PPN meetings. Over 120 are on the mailing list, including people who have taken part in other Peckham Vision events and wanted to join the planning mailing list. The new Google doc table of development sites for the monitoring and tracking information is proving useful to keep track of many details and identify which sites need action of some sort. This is also enabling a closer look at the cumulative impact of different development sites. The meeting also looked at the preparations for the next consultation on the New Southwark Plan (NSP). The forthcoming summer events starting in May at Goose Green were an essential part of informing the public about the planning developments and issues. Volunteers are needed for the Peckham Vision stall with the mobile exhibition. The next meeting will be on 6th June 7-9pm.

1st February 2016 meeting

The PPN’s February meeting was attended by 26 people. It was the 1st meeting of the second year of regular meetings. PPN had started in August 2013 following a year of informal monthly meetings preparing for the PNAAP Examination in Public hearings in July 2013. The consistent and growing attendance at PPN was evidence of the success of the developing process. The previous week had seen the highly successful public community meeting of over 200 discussing, in front of the Council, the local vision for Peckham for the planning policy in the New Southwark Plan (NSP). This successful meeting followed the Peckham Vision arranged workshop in November 2015 with Council officers on planning policies and the draft NSP.

The draft development map for Peckham town centre, which Peckham Vision had produced and displayed at the 27th January meeting (see here: http://www.peckhamvision.org/wiki/Major_developments), had shown how the planning issues are multiplying now that the PNAAP is being implemented. The PPN is providing a way for local people to understand together through experience how the planning and development process works, and so is improving local chances of influencing it. At this 1st February 2016 PPN meeting, we continued to pool our information about the different sites, highlighting issues to focus on to make comments on the New Southwark Plan, and we continued to develop the PPN processes further.

2015

7th December 2015 meeting

The PPN's December meeting was attended by 23 local people, with a high level of interest in the planning issues relating to individual development sites, conservation and planning policy. It was the 6th meeting of the first year of the regular bi-monthly meetings. The development of the PPN from an ad hoc small group of local people focussing on co-ordinating specific planning campaigns, into the entry point for anyone interested in learning about community involvement in town centre planning and development, seems to be working well.

In 2015 the mailing list has almost doubled from about 60 to 110, and attendance at more frequent meetings has more than doubled from 8 to between 15 and 23. We still need to attract people from a more diverse ethnic and age range, but work in hand is preparing the way for this longer term development. If you have any suggestions for this please let us know.

The PPN is now developing a capability to track planning applications and development sites, and to identify generic issues arising from them. The good management, planning and development of the bimonthly meetings are a key to the sustainability and self management of the PPN. The development of templates for the agenda and meeting action notes is paving the way for distributing tasks amongst those attending meetings to enable PPN to become self managing.

15th November 2015 NSP workshop

This was a workshop about the New Southwark Plan (NSP) Preferred Option out for consultation. 25 people attended. Three Council Planning officers led by Tom Buttrick explained the background and gave an outline of the many policies covered in the NSP. The workshop divided into three groups for more detailed discussion. Feedback: This was the first workshop of its kind I have ever heard about (I am 22) let alone been invited to. More workshops and events, of this shape and size, would be good. I also echo one of the sagest comments going around the room, which was for all of us build these types of conversations and understandings into our daily lives, and children's and young adults' lives at school, college, play and work.