Agenda item

Catford Town Centre masterplan update –Charlotte Harrison, Head of Strategic Regeneration, LBL Council.

The Catford Town Centre Framework presentation covered several areas of work currently in process by the council. The council are currently working on a delivery strategy and appointed consultants in 2022 to develop a delivery strategy is being set out to bring forward the project areas that the council have control over. This delivery strategy should be completed later this year, this will be in line with the TFL work discussed earlier in the meeting as the town centre and proposed road changes are linked. The aim is to make Catford the greenest town centre. The Plassey Island site is not being updated on at this meeting, as currently there has not yet been a planning application made by Barratt homes.

Holbeach road improvements:

Improvements have been made to the public space at the Rushey Green end of Holbeach road including improved lighting, cctv, adding trees and seating and this has been received really well and is a much-improved environment. The council are also working with Holbeach school to create a mural. An open call was made for artists to submit ideas. Artists have submitted designs and the team are consulting with the school and other residents to develop these ideas. The hope is that the mural will be installed this summer.

Catford shopping centre: Improvements have been made to the outside of the new Catford library, including a bright and uplifting painted floor and new seating put in. The old, tired and unused seating has been removed, and a new seating space has been put in which incorporates a play space, reading chair for children and planters. This area will open in June for people to sit, rest, play and ties in with the new library area.

Area between Catford and Catford Bridge stations.

The council engaged design consultants January this year working to improve the public realm between both stations to provide an improved sense of space on arrival, make the space greener, improve accessibility and make the space better for pedestrians as well as feeling safer. This project is being worked on currently, in collaboration with network rail, Barrett and key stakeholders, who have land interests in the area Catford Food market now takes place here.

The Catford Constitutional Club:

The ccc, closed to the public since 2018. Work started on site in April this year with completion hopefully by April next year and opening in summer of 2024. This will be a new community hub with a community kitchen, the old ccc was the Victorian section of a larger building, the Georgian section that was previously unused, will be opened up to create triple hight space for events and community space, possibly community gallery. The council will be working with a new provider who will be announced in due course. This is a very exciting project for the town centre.

Thomas lane yard: The current car park site, next to Milford Towers behind Catford Broadway. The council are proposing to deliver approximately 100 affordable homes on that site, 2 blocks, 1 at c 80 meters and 1 at c 30 meters and will have 2 thirds commercial space on the ground floor – this will also improve the public realm, and sense of arrival and will include green space and a new access way to the town centre. This project should coming to planning in 2023 hopefully on site in 2025-2027 as is the next affordable housing offer for the council.

Summary of discussion points. Main discussions were around incremental changes rather than seeing a holistic overarching plan, many residents felt that Catford TC was unsafe and there were lots of issues with anti social behaviour and that people simply don’t want to go there while it is like this. There should be more focus on better architecture now, rather than meanwhile usage and public art etc.

Residents were very interested in being more involved with the regeneration and that the community has a great deal of skill and experience and should be part of the ongoing dialogue and a co-design approach would be appreciated. One resident group, the Catford alliance, challenged the council to work with the group going forward and there was an agreement that a discussion would be had.

Concerns were also raised about the retail outlets being put over to development would affect the local economy and jobs, however it was noted that any new developments were likely to have a retail and housing mix.

The matter of Milford towers would be picked up at a later meeting as that is not in the remit of the speaker, although work is currently being done improving the windows and doors of the Milford towers properties.

There were additional questions around concerns that a number of the parking areas were going around the Plassey Island and Thomas Lane sites people are worried about those with mobility issues not being able to park in the future when the redevelopments happen. There was an acknowledgement that the parking would be greatly reduced, but in fact this is extremely rare to have as much parking as there currently is. There was a call to hold a more detailed agenda item on parking specifically at a later date.

Cllr Royston thanked Charlotte for attending the meeting.