KINGSTON AND NORTH KINGSTON NEIGHBOURHOOD

Conservation Areas Advisory Committee

PLANNING APPLICATION COMMENT FORM DATE: 9 September 2026

N/A

RBK ref: 26/01505/FUL

Address: Lever House 3 St James Road Kingston Upon Thames KT1 2BA Planning Officer: Joel Turner

Description of proposed works: Demolition of existing Lever House building and the construction of two buildings up to 18 storeys in height to accommodate co-living (Sui Generis) accommodation, co-working floorspace and ancillary cafe, and affordable housing (Use Class C3), associated internal and external amenity space, public realm, play space, hard and soft landscaping, cycle parking and other associated works.

APPRAISAL

By full committee on …… 9 September 2026 …… with …… 6 …… members present

Issued on 9 Sep 2026

1. Positive support		2. No objection
3. Objection	X	4. Objection unless revised as below
5. No comment/neutral		6. Lack of detail
7. Decision already issued

Reason for objection:

Strong objection:
1. Existing 2021 outline permission for a 16 storey/ 62.36m max building was described at the time by Historic England as ‘At the limit of acceptability’. It expires in Dec this year.
2. This new PA is for a (19+8)=27 storey/ (70+38)=108m development on what all parties agree is a very compact site. Such extreme intensification would severely damage RBK’s established skyline character, VHIVs & surrounding built heritage/ CAs & would breach the LPA’s existing core strategy & its regulation 19 draft plan.
3. The LPA’s DRP has produced three reports on the scheme. They are damning & reject the developer’s proposals. The applicant, however, has paid no attention. But without the DRP’s support, this application cannot succeed.
4. The co-living block at 70m+ high is unacceptable because of the substantial harm it would cause to the Town’s rich heritage in such close proximity. And in our view, co-living is an expensive fad with spare capacity already available elsewhere in the Town centre. It would only deliver 255*1/1.8=140 max new of homes of ‘unliveable proportions’ according to the DRP. Future adaptability to traditional market housing is questionable & has not been rigorously tested by the applicant, although on their own figures would produce just 73 new homes.
5. While 27 additional affordable homes is welcome, this number would fall well below the LPA’s policy threshold & would come at an unjustified cost to the Town’s heritage. Furthermore, the disparity in height (ten storeys/ 33m) between the two towers would be risible, lacking any cohesion. In addition, significant flanks of the affordable block (notably east, facing the grade 2 listed museum, library & Fairfield CA) would be too passive in appearance with no articulation or visual interest.
6. The carbon footprint from such a large new construction project would be substantial as compared to refitting the pre-existing block. The evidence base submitted by the applicant for this choice is incomplete, which we have chased up with the officer & applicant.
7. The Heritage Impact Assessment submitted by the applicant is of very poor quality & should not have been validated in its current state: part one contains myriad misspellings & missing pages which we have reported to the case officer. It also overstates the applicant’s engagement with Historic England (HE). Even though a statutory consultee, we are aware that HE was not consulted by the applicant before the PA was published - which is shocking. They have confirmed that they will be commenting during the current consultation period.