Greenwich Council has unveiled its long-awaited plans to clamp down on new HMOs in the borough – although it may be some time before they come into force.
The proposed new rules are part of the council’s updated Local Plan, a formal document which guides its planning policy and how it sees the future of the borough. The last plan was implemented in 2014, and the first draft of the latest plan, which is due to run until 2038, will go before the council’s cabinet next week.
The plan also includes an increase of overall “affordable” housing targets to 50 per cent and sets out the kind of development it would like to see on sites around the borough – including building housing and shops on the Charlton retail parks, giving hints of the kinds of sites where major developments could come in the years to come. It also indicates where tall buildings would be permitted.
However, the process of adopting a local plan is slow: in Lewisham, a new plan was adopted this summer after four years of consultations, a public hearing, and a submission to planning inspectors, who can propose changes. For Greenwich, a six-week initial consultation is due to begin next month.
While the dense document will help shape the borough for years to come, it is the proposals for how to deal with HMOs that will be most eagerly anticipated by many residents in areas where they have objected to family homes being converted into bedsits, but councillors have been powerless to refuse the schemes.
The existing local plan is silent on the issue of HMOs, and until 2017, landlords often did not even have to apply for planning permission.
The new plan says that HMOs “will not be supported” in a series of wards across the north of the borough where more than 2 per cent of properties have already been converted — Plumstead & Glyndon, Greenwich Peninsula, East Greenwich, Charlton Village & Riverside, and Greenwich Creekside — if it can be shown they would lead to an “overconcentration” of such uses.
“Overconcentration” is defined as more than two HMOs side by side; the sandwiching of a single self-contained house or flat between two HMOs; more than two HMOs within a run of ten properties on one side of the road; or more than one HMO in a road of fewer than ten properties.
In other areas, the new plan proposes only allowing homes to be divided into HMOs if the building has floorspace of more than 90 square metres and or either in a controlled parking zone – in which case the residents would be banned from having permits – or in areas outside CPZs, would not add to parking problems. They would also have to provide cycle parking, “adequate indoor communal space” and not detract from the character of the area.
At present HMOs are clustered around Deptford, west Greenwich and the Greenwich Peninsula – including in recently-built developments – as well as along the A206 in east Greenwich and Charlton, and in the Plumstead area.
But the proposals are likely to disappoint residents in areas such as Plumstead Common, Shooters Hill and Eltham, where HMO applications have brought controversy in recent months.
Converting smaller houses into flats would also be banned across the borough under the new plan.
The council has also signalled a halt to expanding the retail parks in Charlton, saying there will be “a presumption against further expansion of out-of-centre retail and leisure uses within the Charlton Riverside Opportunity Area”, with sites throughout the area identified as being suitable for housing and “limited” numbers of tall buildings. The area has long been earmarked for thousands of new home.
The document also includes the first clues to Greenwich Council’s plans to redevelop council estates, with opportunities for tall buildings noted at the Abbey Wood Estate, the East and West Glyndon estates in Plumstead, the Woolwich Dockyard Estate and the Coldbath and Orchard Estates in Lewisham. “The potential for significant development has been identified,” the paper says of these sites.
Some 51 sites have detailed descriptions of how they could be redeveloped – they include the Calderwood Street car park in Woolwich, where residents in a neighbouring development are on the hook for part of an £8 million to fix crumbling concrete because of part of the car park is leased to the building’s owner.
The overall proportion of “affordable” housing would be bumped up to 50 per cent, although many private developments would still have a target of 35 per cent. The rest would be found through “council-led initiatives”, and demand for 50 per cent “affordable” housing on public sector land or industrial sites where capacity would be lost.
Of the “affordable” housing, 60 per cent would be for social rent – for people on the housing waiting list – while 40 per cent would be classed as “intermediate”. However, the council says it would discounted rents over shared ownership, noting that only 1,150 households would be able to afford shared ownership.
The full proposed local plan, which stretches for hundreds of pages and defines how the council sees the future of each area, is at item nine in the agenda for Wednesday’s cabinet meeting.
📩 Follow The Greenwich Wire on Bluesky, Facebook, LinkedIn or Threads. You can also sign up for WhatsApp alerts – or subscribe to our emails through the blue box above.
You must be logged in to post a comment.