Charlton – Page 12 – The Charlton Champion

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

January 25, 2022June 19, 2023Darryl 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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Fairview New Homes tries again to add convenience store to Victoria Way development

January 20, 2022June 19, 2023Darryl Chamberlain

40 Victoria Way — The Bowen Drive development in its marketing pomp: The proposed store would be on the ground floor

The developer behind 330 new homes on Victoria Way is trying again to add a convenience store to the development – months after its first attempt was refused.

Fairview New Homes controversially won permission for the development on the old Thorn Lighting site in January 2018, and the first residents moved into Bowen Drive nearly two years ago.

Last summer it applied to Greenwich Council for permission to cut three floors of planned office space down to two, and to change the ground floor of the development’s northeasternmost building – the one nearest to the terraced houses on Victoria Way – to a convenience store.

But council planners refused the application. While there were 22 objections – on grounds ranging from traffic, pollution and noise to “concern that the development would bring non-residents into the estate” – planners blocked the scheme because Fairview had not provided adequate proof that it had marketed the office space within the development to potential occupiers.

Now Fairview is back with a new application. It said it had struggled to sell the office space and that there is “limited demand for office accommodation across [Greenwich] borough and the limited demand which did arise was focused outside of Charlton and primarily within the borough’s town centres” and the st.

Fairview added that its office space was also competing with The Gateway, the Greenwich Enterprise Board building opposite in Troughton Road, which is also “suffering continued vacancies”. (GEB’s website says there are no vacancies there.)

The developer says a convenience store would generate 14 jobs, compared with 18 for the office space.

As with the previous application, the convenience store operator is not named. The Co-op and Sainsbury’s have taken spaces in new developments in the area in recent years – a new Co-op opened in Greenwich Millennium Village late last year.

Residents can comment on the proposal and see more details on the Greenwich Council website.

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Mamma Mia! comes to Charlton Assembly Rooms in March – tickets on sale now

January 18, 2022June 19, 2023The Charlton Champion1 Comment

Mamma Mia! promo image — You might want to brush up on the film version before seeing the show…

Last year we told you about the new Charlton Village Theatre’s forthcoming production of the Abba musical Mamma Mia! Now the tickets are on sale – and there’s one last chance to join the cast too. GWEN ZAMMIT, the show’s producer, explains all…

We would love you to join Charlton Village Theatre at one of our four performances of Mamma Mia!, which is being held at The Assembly Rooms, The Village, Charlton SE7 on Friday 4 March at 7.45pm, Saturday 5 March at 4pm and 7.45pm and Sunday 6 March at 6pm.

Everyone is welcome! Tickets cost £15 for an adult or £5 for a child, which can be ordered in advance on 020 8856 7373 or you can take your luck by turning up on the day – but there is a good chance we may be sold out.

Mamma Mia! is a spectacular musical written by Catherine Johnson with music and lyrics by Benny Andersson & Björn Ulvaeus. Our Charlton show is produced by Gwen Zammit, BEM, and the musical director is Richard O’Shea. The cast members are members of our community and have aimed for a professional standard.

We are still looking for dancers, singers and chorus members – the next rehearsal you can turn up for is Friday 21 January at 8pm in The Assembly Rooms.

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‘Affordable’ housing slashed as Charlton Riverside developer tries to please councillors

January 13, 2022June 19, 2023Darryl Chamberlain1 Comment

Aitch render — Despite the bus, this is the view from Westmoor Street

Local people waiting for housing could lose out after a developer submitted a new plan for homes on the Charlton Riverside, just a few months after Greenwich councillors threw out their first scheme.

Last year, Aitch Group’s plans for 188 homes on land between Eastmoor Street and Westmoor Street, close to the Thames Barrier, along with shops, workspace and a new green space were thrown out by Labour and Conservative councillors who objected to its height. It comprised two blocks of five to nine storeys.

The Coopers Yard development would have included 40 homes for London Affordable Rent – available to people on Greenwich borough’s 23,000-strong housing waiting list – and 10 for shared ownership, making a total of 30 per cent “affordable” housing.

Aitch has now appealed against that decision, but has now returned with a new application to build 149 homes in blocks of up to eight storeys as well as retail and business space.

In the new scheme, just 11 homes would be for affordable rent, and four for shared ownership with the new application – making just 11 per cent “affordable” housing.

Local lobby groups, including the Charlton Society and the Charlton Central Residents Association, were enraged by the original plans for buildings of up to nine storeys, believing this broke the terms of a masterplan they were closely involved in writing.

However, they are unlikely to be won over by the new plan, which is just one storey shorter.

Eastmoor Street as it is now. The flats would overlook Barrier Gardens on the right

A four-year-old masterplan for the Charlton Riverside – which both Greenwich Council and City Hall have long earmarked for thousands of new homes – suggests a maximum height of ten storeys for buildings, with guidelines of three to five storeys in that particular area.

The situation is complicated by the Environment Agency objecting to ground-floor housing close to the Thames Barrier because of the risk of flooding – an objection which calls parts of the masterplan into question.

Similar concerns also led to a second scheme on a site next door, from the housing association Optivo, also being rejected, with councillors voting down 67 affordable-rent flats. Optivo has also launched an appeal.

Apart from the lower heights and lack of “affordable” housing, the revised Aitch scheme is largely the same as the one rejected last year, with a “green link” to Barrier Gardens between the two blocks of housing, and an eight-storey tower on the corner of Mirfield Street and Westmoor Street.

The entire area is currently industrial land at present. With the exception of a single flat behind the derelict Victoria pub, no proposals for the Charlton Riverside have been approved since the masterplan was approved in 2018. Plans for a second flat are awaiting a decision.

Read full details about the proposal: Design and access statement and planning statement

More details and comment: Greenwich Council planning website

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Time to wassail away again in East Greenwich Pleasaunce this Sunday

January 11, 2022June 19, 2023The Charlton Champion

The Morris dancers are returning to East Greenwich Pleasaunce again

After a break because of the pandemic, East Greenwich Pleasaunce’s New Year Wassail is back this Sunday. RICH SYLVESTER explains more…

As with all local parks, East Greenwich Pleasaunce has been a place to escape to during the pandemic. Beneath the veteran trees on this site a new orchard of plums, apples and pear trees was planted in 2012. Volunteers can join – Planting in the Pleasaunce – or Pip! to care for these trees.

Pip! also organises an annual wassail. This old English tradition – connected to Twelth Night – is to celebrate and bless the trees with cider in the hopes of a good harvest in the coming year.

The event is from 1-2.30pm on Sunday 16th January. The Greenwich Morris Men will provide some lively dancing, there will be wassail songs from Morrigan and Halstow Community Choir and some cracking tunes from Penny Gunstone and the band Clanjamfry.

Plus cider and a range of food and drink from the Pleasaunce Cafe. You are encouraged to bring drums, instruments, pots and pans!

See more at the Pip! Wassail Facebook page.

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Charlton Conservative Club: Seven flats to replace scrapped mega-bedsit scheme

December 31, 2021June 19, 2023Darryl Chamberlain1 Comment

Google image of the Charlton Conservative Club — The old Charlton Conservative Club (image: Google)

A property developer has applied to build seven flats at the former Charlton Conservative Club, a year after plans to build 26 bedsits there were scrapped.

Permission was given in 2015 for flats and a terrace of three houses on the site, but work was never completed and in 2020, a new application was submitted for the bedsits, to accommodate 49 people, as part of a “co-living” development.

That scheme was quickly dropped, and now developers have scaled back their original plans to just seven flats – three of which have already been built as part of the first proposal.

While the club’s former billiard hall would have been demolished, it is now to be retained and converted into homes. Developers say: “It is not sustainable to remove the rear building to build another almost identical one. Therefore, it is proposed to retain the rear building and to simply convert it. There would be no terrace houses proposed in the back garden and the submitted plans show communal garden space with cycle stores.”

In September 2020 plans to demolish what is left of the Charlton Liberal Club were refused by planners, who said there was no evidence that the club was unviable as it had only been on the market for one month.

Plans to build a “luxurious” 49-unit co-living development at the old Antigallican pub further down Charlton Church Lane were withdrawn in March, just weeks after plans were submitted.

The latest Conservative Club plans can be seen on the Greenwich Council planning website.

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Shisha restaurant and music venue plan for Euro Car Auctions building

December 15, 2021June 19, 2023Darryl Chamberlain

The restaurant and music venue would occupy the east end of the building

A car auction house on the Woolwich Road could be joined by a shisha restaurant and music venue if its plans are approved by Greenwich Council.

Part of the Euro Car Auctions building, close to the Victoria pub, could be revamped to include a nightspot in space at the east end of the building.

Euro Car Auctions plan — The real-life building is unlikely to include palm trees

The application is brief and only mentions a shisha restaurant and alterations to the exterior of the building to include an open ventilation screen and floral wall, but plans submitted to the council include a music venue and recording space. Images supplied with the application, rather oddly, show palm trees surrounding the site, which is on industrial land but is opposite houses and flats.

Euro Car Auctions, which is behind the plan, hopes that a recent change in planning laws means that permission will only be a technicality, as auction houses and restaurants now fall under the same category.

However, the council may take a greater interest in what goes on as it owns the freehold to the site, having bought it as part of its long-term plans to transform the Charlton riverside into a residential area.

More details can be found on the Greenwich Council planning website.