Lambeth Approve Doon Street Tower

Lambeth Approve Doon Street Tower

Coin Street Community Builders have secured the approval of their planned tower at Doon Street from Lambeth Council despite the opposition against the scheme from many quarters.

Designed by Lifschutz Davidson Sandilands the project is a 140 metre tall largely residential tower, the construction of which will fund the leisure, health and education facilities it stands above that Coin Street Community Builders have been trying to secure money to pay for from various governmental bodies for years without luck.

Opposition predictably has come from English Heritage but less predictably from the Commission for Architecture and Built Environment, both of whom are worried about the impact of the scheme from a private members room of the historic Somerset House on the north bank of the River Thames.

Others who have come out against it include Brian Perry, a former architect at Sir Denys Lasdun & Partners who designed the National Theatre claiming a tower next to it was "completely out of proportion."

Ironically for Brian Parry the National Theatre are in favour of the proposals as are a smattering of other cultural venues on the South Bank including the Tate Gallery.

Approved by the planning committee of Lambeth Borough Council last night the scheme now goes up before the Mayor of London, Ken Livingstone who will pass judgement on whether his office should approve it. It then faces its obligatory call-in period to get through first where the Secretary of State for Communities, Hazel Blears, can decide whether it should have a public inquiry held or not.

Whether the likes of English Heritage, still battered from the inquiry into 20 Fenchurch Street they were bounced into, will want a public inquiry or for that matter be able to pay for one, remains to be seen.

Even if they do, Hazel Blears is unlikely to call the Doon Street Tower in for a public inquiry, not least as Beetham's London plans, just a short distance down the road, also got through without further complications.

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