Wandsworth Council’s own officers have recommended it for refusal while nearly 5,000 people have signed a petition against the Battersea plan
Plans to build a ‘disaster’ 29-storey tower at the bottom of Battersea Bridge have been recommended for refusal, in a major setback to the controversial scheme. Wandsworth Councilofficers said developer Rockwell’s proposals to replace the six-storey Glassmill office building on Battersea Bridge Road should be rejected.
The council’s Planning Committee will soon meet to vote on Rockwell’s proposals to build the 29-storey tower with 110 flats on the site – including 54 affordable homes, which would be offered at social rent. The block would have workspace for small businesses and a community hub for local charities.
Council officers recommended the committee reject the plans in a new report, ahead of the highly-anticipated meeting. They said the scheme goes against policy as the site lies in a mid-rise building zone in the Wandsworth Local Plan for 2023 to 2038, where only a maximum of six storeys, or 18 metres above ground, is considered appropriate. They added the scheme would only meet 5.6 per cent of the borough’s annual need for homes, when considered in the context of homes already built and in the pipeline, which would be a ‘relatively modest contribution’.
The report ruled: “The proposal, by reason of its excessive height and scale, within an established local spatial character that is predominantly low-rise, while also being located within a low-rise policy zone, would represent an unacceptable and incongruous transformative change within the location that would significantly harm the spatial character of the same location. The significant harm identified has not been outweighed by material considerations that indicate otherwise.”
Officers’ concerns echo those raised by objectors to the scheme since it first emerged in early 2024. Residents have slammed the scale of the proposed tower and said it would spoil the skyline, cause traffic mayhem and unacceptably tower over surrounding homes – particularly 6 Hester Road, an affordable housing block run by Peabody, which faces the site.
Officers said in their report that they did not consider the new flats would significantly harm the transport network, and that 6 Hester Road would not receive an unacceptable reduction in sunlight.
Rob McGibbon, Editor of The Chelsea Citizen, launched a Change.org petition in June opposing the plans, which has gained more than 4,970 signatures so far.
Mr McGibbon, who lives in Chelsea, told the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS): “I am entirely against this development. It is the wrong project, in the wrong location and proposed by the wrong company. There is united opposition across the board with good reasons on every level. It is essentially a toxic tower that would be a catastrophe in every conceivable way.
“The tower is quite simply far too big for this site. It will destroy a precious and irreplaceable historic riverside vista. Granting planning permission will also set a dangerous precedent for other developers to move in and build high-rise blocks to make a buck.
“On other equally serious matters, I am also deeply concerned about the lack of clarity that Rockwell Property has presented in its planning application. Too much detail is missing. They are leaving so much to confusion and open for convenient change.”
Other residents told the LDRS the tower would not serve the needs of existing or future residents. Caroline Gardiner described the development as a ‘slap in the face’ to the community and said it would cause major disruption, before and after construction, increasing congestion levels and putting strain on other nearby bridges. She said redeveloping the existing Glassmill building with a more sensible scheme would be better for locals and the environment.
Ms Gardiner said: “Why are we being lumbered with a building that we don’t want, and that’s ruining the lives of the people who are already here?”
Christina, another resident, who did not wish to give her surname, told the LDRS she was particularly worried about construction work that would be needed to build the tower, and extra footfall it would bring, near an already congested and dangerous crossing at the bottom of Battersea Bridge.
“Building there in particular is an accident waiting to happen,” Christina said. She added: “I think [the Glassmill] should be redeveloped sensibly and thought about and done in a considered way.”
Residents also slammed Rockwell’s methods to generate support for the scheme ahead of the council’s planning meeting. A total of 1,923 objections have been published on the authority’s planning portal so far, along with 1,887 letters of support – with many of these support letters following the same template and uploaded in batches.
Rockwell has canvassed in Battersea to collect letters of support, while a third-party website for the development invites people on its homepage to sign a template letter to be uploaded to the council’s website in their name, or to generate their own reasons for supporting it, without detailing its height.
Rockwell previously told the LDRS that gathering voluntary letters of support through canvassing and advertising is standard industry practice, with each letter showing ‘genuine backing’ for the plans.
But residents believe these tactics undermine the letters’ credibility and the council’s planning process. They questioned how well informed people were about the scheme when signing up to support it through a third-party website, or what information they were given when canvassed.
Mr McGibbon added: “This project has disaster written all over it and Wandsworth Council’s Planning Committee should have the courage to dismiss it instantly.”
See article on MyLondon
