Celebrated architect Lord Richard Rogers has been asked to test the possibility of squeezing even more homes into the Thames Gateway’s London section.
The London Development Agency and the Thames Gateway London Partnership are working with Rogers at the behest of London mayor Ken Livingstone, using their new investment model (see above) to see if up to 150,000 new homes are achievable (HT 12 March, page 10).

They will plot the financial and infrastructural implications of this number, which is 60,000 more than the LDA and the partnership looked at in their recent study and nearly three times the 59,000 figure used by the ODPM in the original Communities Plan.

A source at the mayor’s architecture and urbanism unit said the work was at a very early stage, with a number of different scenarios being explored.

“We’re all assuming that without pushing very hard we could get significantly higher numbers than the 91,000 currently being talked about,” he said.

The results will report to the London Partnership Board – headed by the mayor and housing minister Keith Hill – within the next three to four months.

It will also feed into the mayor’s housing capacity study for the capital, which was started after it was realised the London Plan’s 21,400 homes per year would not come close to meeting the demand.

Source

Housing Today