This  is your the update on the Future Clapham area regeneration. As you will be aware the developer Cathedral are currently continuing to fundraise for the Future Clapham scheme. While this process is ongoing preparations for the anticipated demolition works are underway. If you live in an adjacent or adjoining property to the development site Cathedral will be contacting you shortly with further details and surveying information.

Cathedral are preparing to demolish Mary Seacole House in November 2009 and we will keep you informed of progress further over the coming weeks. During this time the Leisure Centre will remain open and continue to offer a full range of services.

We are committed to keeping you updated with news as it develops and will pass on further information as soon as we have it.

The Future Clapham Team

For more information visit www.lambeth.gov.uk/futureclapham

On Friday 18 October, as part of the Future Clapham project, the thriving Clapham Pottery will celebrate its move to the attractive former chapel in Rectory Grove, previously the site of CAVE adult literacy school. The Mayor of Lambeth will officially open the site at 4pm.

Clapham Pottery is a self-funding not-for-profit community organization that has been operating at Clapham Leisure Centre for many years. The Pottery has gone from strength to strength since the long-established, professional North Street Potters took over its management two years ago. The group is committed to serving the wider community and each week this fine building will now be home to pottery classes and workshops for 150 students of all ages and all abilities. 

As part of the Future Clapham scheme, the Leisure Centre is due for demolition and rebuilding. Labour councillors insisted that the future of the Pottery was made secure and we have worked with the group and with officers to ensure the pottery would find a new home.

We were impressed by the efforts that led to Lambeth Council re-housing the project at: The Old Chapel, 4A Rectory Grove, SW4 0DZ

Under the preceding Conservative /LibDem administration, the Leisure Centre and neighbouring depot would have been sold off, with no allowance made for many of the popular clubs and classes.

Cllr Haselden said ‘I am delighted that this building is going to be kept in community use and that the longer-term future of Clapham Pottery has been secured.’

‘As councillors we were determined that Clapham Pottery stayed in Clapham to provide its much-valued service to a wide range of local people.’

Ambitious plans to regenerate Clapham have been given the go-ahead by Lambeth Planners. The council’s development partner, Cathedral Group, was granted permission for the multi-million pound Clapham One development at a planning committee meeting..

Part of the Future Clapham scheme, the development will deliver new, high quality public facilities for Clapham at no cost to the tax-payer. The scheme will also deliver 199 new homes.

It involves the redevelopment of two sites in Clapham:

Mary Seacole House on Clapham High Street will be re-developed to provide a state-off-the-art community library, healthcare centre and 136 new homes.

Clapham Leisure Centre site will be transformed to create a brand new facility – including a six-lane, 25 metre pool, a 100 station gym and a four-court sports hall – as well as 63 apartments.

The Mary Seacole House development is subject to final approval by the Greater London Authority, a decision is expected by the end of April.

For more information visit www.lambeth.gov.uk/futureclapham

This evening Councillor O’Malley and I attended a meeting at Lambeth Town Hall with Debbie Hunter, head of Lambeth’s regeneration team and with Councillor Haselden, joining us via a telephone conference call.

Debbie was giving us an update on progress with the plans for the new leisure centre in Clapham Manor Street. It was clear that a huge amount of work has been done firming up the project and putting into place temporary leisure provision whilst Clapham Leisure Centre is rebuilt.

More news will be coming to you soon and I shall see if I can get a copy placed here. The latest update includes details of facilities that we are making available during the project, to make sure that as many people as possible can continue to use our leisure service.

The developer will soon be seeking planning permission for the new buildings. In the meantime the team continue to discuss any concerns held by local people, including residents on Voltaire and Edgeley Roads who will be most affected by the development.

Importantly, local groups such as the Clapham Society remain engaged and changes have been made following their input. We are still campaigning for the whole of the existing library building to be made available to the local community, rather than the original plan, which included selling part of the building to pay for improvements. We are very hopeful that our concerns have been listened to.

As Lambeth’s Design Champion, Cllr Haselden has been able to contribute to the scheme since its early days. The champion role helps us to continually emphasise the value that we put on good design, to channel the ideas and expectations of local people into the project – particularly in the sessions with schools and the drop-in workshops – and to contribute to the shortlisting of design teams and the ‘competitive dialogue’ part of Future Clapham, where the final three design teams worked up their proposals in more detail, before Cathedral was chosen as our preferred developer.

Please visit the Future Clapham Newsletter (June 2008)

Please visit the Clapham Leisure Centre survey on the Lambeth website.

Contact the Future Clapham team

Freephone 0800 052 6336 

Email futurelambeth@lambeth.gov.uk

www.lambeth.gov.uk/futureclapham