The Heygate estate is way out of date. Are plans to regenerate it future-proof?

Interested in housing issues? Join LabourList and Pascal Mittermaier  for a free breakfast on Monday 23rd September at Labour Conference to debate flats, private landlords, mortgages, local authority builds and the like: Will Labour’s plan meet our housing needs? See you at Brighton Mercure, Coast View Room 1 at 8.30am! RSVP to [email protected] ________________________________________________

When developers get involved in large-scale urban regeneration projects, how can they ensure they don’t make the same mistakes their predecessors did?

Let me tell you about regeneration: ‘The replacement of densely populated and obsolete tenement buildings which have low-environmental standards with a r edevelopment [that is] commensurate with today’s needs and standards including a full range of ancillary services’.

This is exactly what urban planners set out to achieve in 1969 with the redevelopment of the Heygate council estate in Elephant & Castle, South London. That regeneration statement is quoted in original documents dating back to over forty years ago. But with all the best will in the world, the postwar design of the Heygate Estate has not stood the test of time. Soon bulldozers will arrive to start demolishing one of Britain’s largest housing estates, which has fallen victim to high levels of crime and poverty.

Where the Heygate Estate once stood, 2,500 new homes will be built as part of our £1.5 billion scheme to regenerate the area in partnership with Southwark Council. So how can we ensure that whatever replaces the Heygate does not meet the same unfortunate fate? We need to know just what went wrong in the first place.

Once home to nearly 3,000 people, the Heygate Estate was originally constructed in the early 1970s as part of a major regeneration scheme to re-build parts of South London after extensive bombing damage from World War Two.

The Corbusian concept behind the estate’s design  was supposed cater to modern-day living – something that still remains the driving force behind regeneration schemes today. But the estate’s neo-brutalist architecture, characterised by high-rise, high-density buildings, has been cited by many as the catalyst for the crime and anti-social behaviour that eventually led to its demise.

The Heygate’s imposing grey blocks, connected by covered bridges and underpasses, have made it a popular cinematic backdrop for numerous gang related films, including Michael Caine’s Harry Brown, which just increased the local authority block’s reputation for crime and decay.

So, what will the regeneration of this well-intentioned council estate look like and how can we learn from the mistakes of the past? The regeneration of Elephant & Castle is a good example of a local project using global best practices to address major London-wide issues, such as housing, open space and sustainable development. We are planning to build outdoors space and possibilities for social interaction into the Heygate regeneration.  Low-rise buildings will be set around large open spaces and community courtyards. We hope this will encourage better social interaction and community engagement. The open-plan design of the scheme, coupled with better signage and street lighting, should ensure the site becomes a safe and secure environment for residents and visitors.

The Heygate estate regeneration is in a city, but we will focus on creating a sustainable environment, with ecology and nature at the heart of the project. All homes will be designed to maximum energy efficiency and the outdoor areas will be built using the latest innovations in sustainable construction. For example, swales which collect and dissipate rainwater will run alongside the development creating a sense of continuity and openness as well as being environmentally beneficial and visually attractive.

Environmentally sound planning doesn’t have to be expensive. Sustainable building can generate substantial savings which can then be re-invested elsewhere in the development. For example, we plan to build using cross-laminated timber, which is a sustainable solid wood alternative to concrete. The timber’s excellent thermal qualities reduce the amount of energy needed to heat the building. We can use these savings to fund other initiatives like recycling.

The new development will see over 1,200 new trees being planted in neighbouring streets, and the creation of Central London’s largest new park for 70 years – this is a significant achievement, considering that Heygate is in Zone 1. Up to 30,000 sq ft of new public playgrounds will also be part of the new development, plus five new public squares and two smaller parks. We think these changes will hugely improve the air quality in the area which, in turn, will bring health benefits for people who live and work in the area.

Whilst the guiding principles of regeneration may not have changed, the way we implement them has been transformed. We hope that by providing residents with spaces that are more healthy, community-minded and enjoyable, we can work with our partners at Southwark Council to help future-proof large-scale regeneration projects, so they still work for generations to come.

Pascal Mittermaier is Project Director Elephant & Castle and Director of Sustainability, Lend Lease EMEA