Weekly Update From Councillor Guy Lambert

Can Brentford have enough flats?

This has been a quiet week for a variety of reasons so you might have a nice short one this week – let’s see how it all pans out.

Thursday evening was the pre- planning presentation with two items to consider. The first one was right in our ward, and for a batch of 450 flats in Capital Interchange Way, behind the Fountains Leisure Centre and across the road from the similar sized proposal for the site of the Citroen garage. The mayor has just overturned our rejection of the Citroen proposal and we are unlikely to have much room to manoeuvre on this one. It will be run by Catalyst Housing Association (OK) and have 40% affordable housing (details to come about what affordable means and devil is in the detail). Largely car free which, as with all these, begs the question for me as to how the few car parking spaces will be allocated. Probably on the basis of £££ but I think there are some real issues here. We can argue about density, and certainly it looks like, with the Brentford FC development, this one, Citroen and perhaps Chiswick Curve we will have 3 or 4 thousand new homes in this small area (with perhaps B&Q and the Fountains Centre site to follow). I really think we need transport infrastructure in particular to be addressed urgently, but I also moaned about this proposal because I think the architecture and concept is boring. The previous proposal, by the late Will Alsop, had its problems but nobody would have accused it of being boring.

The other proposal was for Brentford FC training ground in Osterley. The Melvinator declared an interest (for – as you may have spotted, he is a Bees fan) and Cllr Louki declared his undying loathing for anything Bee-shaped (he is a QPR fan). Actually both were very balanced – within reason – we all know that you have to be unbalanced to be a councillor. The Brentford people were very open to input from locals and councillors – which came across very well – but it was left to me to point out that the only reason they were proposing redevelopment was because we had issued enforcement notices telling them to get rid of their dodgy illegal Portakabins. They said they were planning to redevelop anyway. In the words of Mandy Rice-Davies, they would say that, wouldn’t they?

Friday was our police Ward Panel in the dungeon beneath Trimmer Walk. I suppose if us councillors and residents did the wrong thing we might never escape. There had been some doubt about whether it was on, because our normal contact PC, Dinesh Pillay, has disappeared over the border into Syon but our other PC, Lee and PCSO, Angela were there, together with various LBH enforcement people, residents etc and the esteemed Editor. I had been rather comically pretending to chair this thing for a while on the basis that no other fool was willing, but I managed deftly to pass the baton to a Lateward Road resident. Not that I’m saying he’s a fool.

Well then, it was a lazy three day weekend and other than a midnight trek to Gatwick to pick up a delayed daughter from her flight back from Rome and a few bike rides around and about – including a photo session with potholes in Lateward and St Paul’s Roads – I didn’t do much.

Talking of flats, what’s this emerging from the ground in Lionel Road? [the south stand of the stadium, as any fule kno, Ed]

I woke up on Tuesday morning with a sore throat, which progressed into full blown man-flu during the day so that was another idle day. On Wednesday I was supposed to meet Krysztof Graylinski, the Polish Roads Minister (yeah, he’s not really called a Polishified Chris Grayling and one hopes he’s not as bad. Actually, it’s not possible to be that bad) with Hounslow Highways but I was in no fit state so ducked that together with my planned inspection of Hounslow High St and Bell Square and a cabinet meeting in the evening.

Thursday I am more or less mended so I have heroically raised myself from near death to reward my faithful reader with a dose of tripe. Then it’s off to a James Bond type rendezvous at a service station somewhere on the M40 for a meeting with another Credit Union chair. Moscow Rules do not apply.

Councillor Guy Lambert

August 30, 2018