Planning Application to change Victorian business premises to flats on Melbourne Grove North

[FairTgirl]

Planning Application to change business premises to flats on Melbourne Grove North

Some business and private residents have just received a letter for Planning application 21/AP/0020 to turn 1B -1C Melbourne Grove, SE22 - a former warehouse in a lovely character Victorian building into 4 private flats.

Comments must be submitted by 11 Feb here: https://planning.southwark.gov.uk/online-applications/applicationDetails.do?activeTab=documents&keyVal=QMF3B2KBKGO00

Over the past few years there has been a trend towards closed business properties being sold and turned into private flats - we hasten to add not social housing or subsidised Government schemes.

Melbourne Grove North section between East Dulwich Station and Jarvis Road has been a run of local independent owner run businesses for 120 years, but over time, and now accelerated by changes in planning, a closed business premises can all too easily be turned into flats. Once they have changed use to residential there is usually no return to retail and we lose local businesses services and the laudable goal of the 15 Minute City, which fails if there are no businesses left in a neighbourhood.

As a neighbour to this property we think this would be a huge shame. The building has a unique frontage which would make for a great independent shop or cafe/restaurant.

We have been approached by businesses such as Gail?s and artisan wine and cheese businesses in the past to lease part of our building and were some of this property at 1B-1C to be retained as a retail business, ie the street level, a really vibrant buzzy business which only enhances this section of Melbourne Grove North, and could lead to something of a revival for this area, currently depressed by restrictions and closures and deserving a much needed boost. A restaurant venture with some outdoor seating and cycle storage seating could really do well here so close to the station.

If the whole building was converted to residential that opportunity will be gone for good. I think given the year local business have endured, we all want to see local independents have every opportunity to bounce back and flourish. Allowing business premises to be turned into flats, especially at street level, unchecked, only contributes to the death of our high-streets.

[Nigello]

We really do not NEED any more bloody cafes here, but we do NEED more places for people to live. Ideally, it would be shared-ownership, etc. but we don't live in an ideal world and people of all shapes, sizes and wallets need places to live. Melbourne Grove is not a high street - it is very mainly residential so please don't speciously use the "save our special shopping streets" argument - it is a valid argument when used in the right place.

[FairTgirl]

The section in which this resides was originally all retail and business, this is the section closest to the station, as mentioned it has been for 120 years, and there can still be scope for residential as well as retail, nor does it have to be cafe.

The point being made is that if this property becomes 100% residential even at street level (in amongst businesses) it will unlikely ever return to business or retail and so ends 120 years of this vital part of community when there is an opportunity for something very appealing on the road that also serves the community.

[ed_pete]

@nigello, don't forget that there's going to be 219 residences on the nearby site of the Hamlet football club. Where will they buy their coffee?

[Jules-and-Boo]

Agree with business/ mixed use. People need to make a living, so long as it?s not more nail shops, cafes, hairdressers or chicken shops

[James Barber]

The application states it would be car free.

Current businesses along Melbourne Grove, with the LTN through traffic blocked, are unhappy. Some kind of ground floor active use could encourage people along Melbourne Grove towards those businesses.

Currently the former warehouse use (for a West End boutique) and dead rear garden walls of 1-3 Railway Rise opposite don't draw people down Melbourne Grove.

With the Melbourne Grove GP closure/move removing some of the previous footfall. And no.3 being derelict land for a number of decades.

This corner of East Dulwich really needs some TLC.

[Nigello]

There is tagging and litter at that end of Melbourne Grove on shop shutters and commercial bins, as well as on the shops that are on that corner. If anyone wants to encourage more business and footfall I suggest tackling these problems and keeping on top of them. (And, yes, I have pointed this out to James McAsh, so please, those who say they are invested in the area, please do the same and do something to keep the area as attractive to business as you wish it to be.)