Planning for a better London

I am appalled that the Green Belt is being considered for development. These open spaces are needed for human relaxation and for wildlife. 
Why do so many people need to come and live in London? 
Why are homeowners and developers being allowed to convert bungalows, that older people would prefer to move to, into houses? Not everyone wants to live in a flat! This is one of the main reasons that older people are not downsizing - there is a lack of suitable properties for them to move to. 
Some flats are just not selling as overpriced and not suitable - I hate the current fad for one living/dining/kitchen room - nowhere to get away from the smells and sounds of cooking - awful! 
ALL properties that have been empty for more than 3 years should be subject to a CPO and then sold to those who need somewhere to live. This will stop speculators/developers land banking for future profit.
No-one should be allowed to purchase domestic property in the UK unless they live and work here - stop foreign property speculation. 

Lastly, if everyone who was not entitled to be here was deported, there would NOT be a housing crisis. If the government follows up on their policy announced today, the demand for more property to be built will reduce as the birth rate is low and more people in the baby boomer period are dying.
I would be in favour, where possible, of adding another floor to properties over shops in high streets as they are often wider roads where the impact will not be as noticeable.

All new developments or redevelopments must include affordable housing if we are to keep London’s population diverse and interesting. 

why do we keep saying we need more homes for londoners when there are tower blocks built for over seas buyers only



 

Fantastic, however most new blocks built have a certain amount of spaces that are being sold to foreign investors making it impossible for local people to move into them. There needs to be more council run housing and those homes being given to people that have been on waiting lists for years in some cases rather than people that have just moved or been moved into the borough.

I believe what is needed is more social housing.   There must be a way of local authorities being able to build more for rent and kept for rent not permitted to be bought then sold for profit or rented out to third parties at "commercial" rent.

I believe London needs to create a huge housing stock over which it has control of the rent.

In general I don't have a problem with mid and high rise development and would rather see this than virgin green belt development. 

As such I think this kind of development should be focused in our town centres, many of which are struggling to reinvent themselves in the age of internet shopping. Let's have more people living in former retail premises rather than them standing empty and denser development in our town centres. The advantages to this are that with more homes in established town centres there are likely to already be good transport links which means less need for a car and easy access to shops/facilities.

That said, I'm not sure people want to live their whole lives in flats so we do need traditional houses too. This means doing something about empty properties and the scourge of landlordism which is snapping up every entry level property to be rented out to young people who might otherwise be able to buy if not for extortionate rents.

Let's also look at building on golf courses which take up a tremendous amount of land for a sport that only a relatively advantaged few Londoners play.

The advantage of this is that golf courses are already considered "developed" so probably fall under the brown field/ grey belt label.

Retail Parks could also be redeveloped. Many are now struggling and the carparks alone are a huge waste of land.

I also think there should be a concerted effort to repurchase former council social housing as they become available (possibly with some sort of legislation that allows councils first refusal) with an aim to restoring housing estates to the purpose for which they were built - to provide cheap, decent housing to Londoners who need it.

House prices already mean many Londoners will have to either rent their entire lives or leave London and that can't be right.

Finally of course we need to continually improve public transport provision for areas with new homes. Maybe developers could be forced to pay for such developments.

Its great and a necessity to build homes however, we need to take into consideration the amount of flooding of places that takes place these days. How healthy green spaces are to people's health and the need for these places. We also need to take into consideration the needs of residents in their areas where their homes are so access to reliable public transport, shops, restaurants, leisure and community facilities. We also need to remember that just cause a certain housing solution may work somewhere in the world does not necessarily mean it will work in London. Why are we not looking at all the vacant buildings and run down estates that would be too costly to fix and remedy and build on  these first than look at brownfield sites. Lewisham has the old Citibank Tower that has been vacant for donkey's years yet whilst building work has taken place around it the tower remains. Now I know Lewisham Precinct is to be redeveloped but imagine the amount of apartments that could be converted in that building for residents. Before anything can  be built as well there's all the costs of research of developing the land. Surely building on vacant properties and old estates no longer suitable for housing people is better option 

It’s all very well building that number of homes over the next ten years, but the infrastructure supporting these homes and the people living there is already majorly overloaded.  In particular, schools, gp surgeries, transport.  

Regarding use of green belt land, there are so many empty and/or derelict homes or buildings, whether commercial or residential, in and around London.  Surely it would make more economic and environmental sense to use these buildings.  If they are owned by private individuals, there  should be a limit as to the length of time a property remains empty/derilict before the council can take ownership and make good the property.

I have three children in their 20s and 30s who will be unlikely to be able to afford property in our area, the suburbs of London.  If they are able to afford a flat, there are so many prospective pitfalls to owning a leasehold property.  I agree with suggestions that leasehold is done away with, and stricter regulations for owners or managing agents be  put in force to protect flat owners.

Mid rise buildings are preferable to traditional home type new buildings as they save space. They can also be made more energy efficient with solar panels and heat pumps which are harder to install on single buildings. Plus, insulation is better - or should be made better.

So many empty properties with owners abroad, should not be allowed when there's a housing crisis. In some countries people have to sell their flats if they've moved abroad for more than ten years. Here I think most flats are empty and have always been empty and are just an investment.

Projects take too long. Estates are demolished and it is a decade+ before they are replaced. Why? London is being ripped off by contractors who seem to be able to do the same job elsewhere in half the time and half the cost. London is full of sites where there is very little happening. Roads are dug up and left for weeks with no one doing any work there. Why? 

Well , my thought for people to be praying for our leaders and the Labour Party for more change for the betterment of our nation. 
God bless you all .👍🙏❤️

My thoughts are , to see that everyone has a better place to call home.

Affordable homes .

No more people sleeping rough. 
And  no one should left  alone when their is crisis.

God bless you Mayor  of London. . You are doing a great job.👍

Spaces must be offered to community-led housing initiatives to ensure that development structures are truly meeting local housing needs, especially amongst disadvantaged and underrepresented groups who for differences in cultural norms are often not adequately catered to in mainstream large scale housing developments. Housing development in flats is fine, but there must be consideration of green and community spaces to allow people living in these spaces to ensure that their housing supports them to realise the physical and mental health outcomes intended from having stable and secure housing.

There are lots of brown field sites with London, look at the TFL estate and what's available , many ofof teh brown field locations have established transport links, if you start to develop on green belt you will need to provide transport and other support such as doctors, schools shopping social activities you can't build in isolation without put in an support infastructure.

developemnt that are appealing not everything should be high rise, low level housing is better in developing a community 

My comment would be why are you looking to built on green spaces when there is plenty of land undeveloped that should be.

For example in the angel n1 you have a sainsbury's and Waitrose that are in very dated 1980 build and a massive car park at the back I would ban car parks in zone 1/3 build on the lot of them.

I couldn't give a monkeys on car drivers.

Islington planed to force development of this site then spent more time working on building on football pitches and look where that got it. 

Plus I think we have to be realistic about the number of homes that London can offer and people can live in other parts of the uk.

I would like to know how many unoccupied properties there are in London.  Great tower blocks get planning permission; once built, many of them are half empty.  

We need homes for people, not investments for absent owners.  Fix the business model.