Author: Darryl Chamberlain

Men over 45: Get yourself a PSA test at The Valley this Saturday lunchtime

Darryl Chamberlain
The Valley
The Valley is hosting blood tests aimed at men over 45 on Saturday

Charlton Athletic will be hosting a PSA testing day for men this Saturday before the Addicks’ home match against Oxford United, which is the club’s Men’s Health Awareness Day.

A PSA test is a blood test that can help diagnose prostate problems, including prostate cancer – the third most common cancer in the UK.

Early diagnosis is crucial but symptoms do not usually appear until the prostate is large enough to effect the urethra – so a PSA test can help spot problems at an early stage. There’s more information from Prostate Cancer UK on what a PSA test involves.

Testing is primarily aimed at men aged 45 and over, although younger men can also sign up.

The tests are being held between noon and 3pm, and are in exchange for a £10 donation to the Barry Kilby Prostate Cancer Appeal.

To sign up, visit bkpca.mypsatests.org.uk/Events/.

You can also donate to support the tests, which are being subsidised by the charity – Charlton’s head of first team player care, Tracey Leaburn, recently conquered her fear of heights to climb the O2 with players and manager Johnnie Jackson.

Sign up to donate at app.investmycommunity.com/campaign-page/walk-over-the-o2.

Match tickets for under-11s are just £1 for the Oxford match, which kicks off at 3pm.

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Charlton’s White Horse pub closes tonight after bedsit plan goes through unopposed

Darryl Chamberlain
White Horse Charlton
The White Horse’s upper floors are being turned into an HMO

The White Horse pub on Woolwich Road closes tonight, four months after a plan to build bedsits for 22 people on its upper floors went through without objections from residents.

London Stay Apartments, a Rotherhithe-based company, applied to Greenwich Council last year to convert the upper floors into an HMO with 11 double rooms, and to make alterations to the bar area.

The company promised the bar would be kept, however, the current operators are moving on after tonight to the Melbourne Arms in Sandy Hill Road, Woolwich, they revealed on their Facebook page.

Greenwich planning officers approved the plan for the White Horse after several previous proposals – including demolishing the 132-year-old pub altogether – were rejected. No objections were received from residents or local groups.

“It is not considered that the proposal would harm the viability of the existing pub,” they wrote in their report.

The once-intimidating pub was revamped and relaunched in 2020 but efforts to take it upmarket were stymied by the coronavirus lockdowns. In a review for this website in December 2020, our reviewer Paul Breen wrote that the pub had “definitely changed beyond recognition” and had moved away from its “shaven-headed incarnation”.

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Romantic concert at St Thomas’ Church for Valentine’s weekend

Darryl Chamberlain
St Thomas Church Charlton-1
St Thomas’ Church is hosting a concert on Sunday February 13

Thanks to JAMES KINSELLA for letting us know about a concert of romantic music by The Charlton Ensemble at St Thomas’ Church in Woodland Terrace on Sunday February 13.

Featuring cello, voice, violin and piano, “relax with friends and listen to a slection of beautiful songs that portray love in all its guises; from the romantic waltzes of Lehar and Novello to passionate Arias and popular songs from the shows”.

The concert starts at 6pm, with tickets costing £10 – call 07989 740 252 to reserve yours.

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Rockwell’s ‘Stalingrad’ plans for Charlton Riverside killed off after site sold for logistics hub

Darryl Chamberlain1 Comment
Anchor and Hope Lane
Rockwell had hoped for approval for its development here

Controversial plans for 771 homes off Anchor & Hope Lane have finally been scrapped after the site was sold to a company promising to revamp it as a logistics hub.

Rockwell’s proposal for the VIP Trading Estate was the first to come forward as part of plans to transform the Charlton riverside to provide up to 8,000 new homes. The scheme was fiercely opposed by residents of Atlas and Derrick Gardens, whose homes would have been in the shadow of the proposed blocks, as well as community groups, councillors and local MP Matt Pennycook.

Rockwell revised scheme
Rockwell’s proposals were rejected three times

The scheme was rejected by Greenwich councillors in 2018, with Sarah Merrill, the chair of planning at the time, saying it was “reminiscent of Stalingrad”. The decision was called in for scrutiny by Sadiq Khan, who rejected it himself. Rockwell then appealed to a planning inspector, but the scheme was rejected a third time.

Greenwich Council officers had originally recommended approving the 11-block development.

After Rockwell lost its appeal, the site was sold by its owner, the property investment company Zenprop, to another property company, Falconbrook. An industry website, React News, reported that Falconbrook had talked to Greenwich Council about building homes on the land.

Anchor & Hope Lane development site
The VIP Trading Estate will now become a logistics hub

But with industrial land now at a premium in London, a third investor, GLI, has snapped the site up – reportedly for £42 million. The site will focus on “last mile” and “last hour” deliveries, the company said.

GLI, which has already snapped up sites in Park Royal, Mitcham and Croydon as part of a push into London, said the revamped hub “will be highly energy efficient and redeveloped on a net zero carbon basis”,

The sale will be a setback to Greenwich and City Hall’s plans for new housing on the Charlton riverside, which have so far yielded just one new home – a flat at the Victoria pub, which is being redeveloped into a pizza outlet – after two other schemes were also refused.

The developer Aitch Group and the housing association Optivo are appealing against the refusal of their plans for new housing off Eastmoor Street, near the Thames Barrier, which together would have provided 255 homes, including 107 for affordable rent. Aitch has also submitted a new application for 149 homes on its site, with just 11 for affordable rent.

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Greenwich Together festival returns to Charlton Park for Platinum Jubilee

Darryl Chamberlain
Charlton Park
Platinum Jubilee events will take over Charlton Park for two days in June

Greenwich Council’s new festival will return to Charlton Park in June to mark the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee weekend.

The Greenwich Together festival made its debut last August, with performances from dub poet Benjamin Zephaniah’s band and a Dua Lipa tribute act.

Now it and a mass family picnic in the park will be the centrepiece of the borough’s celebrations marking the Queen’s 70 years on the throne, which will be marked with a four-day bank holiday weekend.

Greenwich Together ’22 will take place on Thursday 2 June from noon to 7pm, while Picnic in the Park will run from noon to 4pm on Friday 3 June.

Applications are also being invited to hold street parties – interested residents can find more information at royalgreenwich.gov.uk/streetparties.

The announcement was made today to coincide with the 10th anniversary of Greenwich being declared a royal borough.

Council leader Danny Thorpe said: “We’re thrilled to be able to bring our community together once again this summer. This year, we have an extra reason to celebrate to mark the Queen’s Platinum Jubilee so we are planning full weekend of fun for all the family – whether you’ll be attending, performing or setting up a stall, we can’t wait to see residents from across the borough getting involved.”

Traders who are interested in hosting stalls at the events should contact events[at]royalgreenwich.gov.uk, while the council is also offering funding for cultural organisations to take part in the events – more details at royalgreenwich.gov.uk/RGFfunding.

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New plan to replace closed Charlton Liberal Club with six flats

Darryl Chamberlain
Charlton Liberal Club proposal
The new design is planned to fit in with its neighbours

Developers have come forward with a new proposal to replace the closed Charlton Liberal Club building with six flats – their third attempt in two years.

The main Liberal Club building on Charlton Church Lane was converted into flats in 2016, with the club moving to a new building next door, but that closed two years later with its trustees putting it up for sale.

In 2020, a Enfield-based company, Liberal Ltd, applied to build a three-storey building with eight flats – but the proposal was refused by planning officers who criticised the design and said that that the loss of the club would deny the area a community facility and a source of employment.

Charlton Liberal Club
The club closed in October 2018 and has been boarded up since 2020

Last May, another application was submitted, keeping the club in the basement and offering six flats. This plan – which flew somewhat under the radar – was also rejected.

Now the company is back with a “radically different” proposal, once again getting rid of the club but replacing it with a building designed to more closely match its neighbours.

“The proposed replacement building would, instead, be hip-roofed, reflecting that of No 59, an early Victorian villa,” the company says in planning documents. It would contain five two-bedroom flats and one three-bedroom flat.

The application also includes a letter from the estate agent Acorn, which sold the building to developers after receiving 88 enquiries, most of them from buyers looking to turn it into homes.

Charlton Liberal Club
The first plan for the club was rejected two years ago

It said: “It is clear that there is no demand for a Liberal Club in the vicinity, as the sole reason we were instructed to sell the property was because the club were in large amounts of debt being unable to make it financially viable any longer. They stated that this was due to a large change in the local trend and demographic over the past few years, and therefore a lot of their members had moved out of the area or for one reason or another were no longer able to take part in club activities.”

The club saw out its final days as a watering hole for Charlton Athletic fans on their way to matches. The club’s museum was later given a batch of items from its archives.

In December, a plan to convert the nearby Conservative Club into seven flats was submitted to the council.

Full details of the application, and more images, can be found in the design and access statement.

To see more documents and to comment on the application, visit the Greenwich Council planning website.

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KFC coming to Charlton? Asda’s new owner plans new drive-through as McDonald’s rebuilds

Darryl Chamberlain
KFC site
The drive-through would be here – next to McDonald’s, which is currently being rebuilt

Asda’s new owner is hoping to build a new drive-through restaurant – likely to be a KFC – in a corner of the supermarket’s car park, potentially adding to traffic in Charlton’s retail parks.

The planning application from EG Group comes as the next-door McDonald’s is demolished so it can be rebuilt to allow more capacity for cars.

EG Group, owned by Blackburn-born brothers Mohsin and Zubba Issa, bought a majority stake in Asda in December 2020.

The application to Greenwich Council does not name the restaurant – or even include its signage – but EG is the largest KFC franchisee in western Europe.

EG has submitted a number of similar applications for Asda sites around the country, with KFC recently revealing plans to “relocate” its Greenwich branch as a drive-through.

While EG also owns the Leon chain, which has also started to open its own drive-throughs, the applications for those sites have been significantly different.

The one-storey restaurant will have “vegan offerings, which has won an award from PETA”, and promises “no artificial flavours or trans fats”. There will also be facilities to serve fast-food delivery drivers.

Last year an Asda “click and collect” hub was built in the car park and this application shrinks the number of parking spaces further – and will prompt fears of even more traffic congestion on the unpleasant Bugsby’s Way dual carriageway.

The proposed restaurant would be next door to McDonald’s, which has this month demolished its drive-through so it can build a new one. The company says its old premises suffered from subsidence.

Last year McDonald’s was given permission for a two-storey building, with more space for staff, and bigger facilities so it could serve 15 drivers rather than 11.

While drive-throughs would appear to conflict somewhat with Greenwich Council’s claims to be addressing the climate emergency, these are not written into either local or national planning policies, which govern applications such as this.

You can read full details and comment on EG Group’s plans on the Greenwich Council planning website.

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