This
website
is a memorial to The Standard
as it was known locally
Please see the guestbook for recent messages from visitors
Not content with 1,350 flats in blocks up to 9 storeys high, the
Comer Group has announced plans to cram in another 1,078 flats
and make the blocks up to 13 storeys high!
Apart from the pressure on local services and transport, there
would be only 17 parking spaces for every 20 flats on the whole
site, so the surrounding roads would be severely blighted by
overspill parking.
Full details and how you can object to Barnet Council are
available on my campaign website nlbp.eastbar.net
where you can also join the mailing list to keep up to date.
the additional storeys are shown in blue
MP for
Chipping Barnet, Theresa Villiers, says "These plans are
disgraceful. The last application for 1350 flats and houses was
already an overdevelopment of the site. To squeeze in over a
thousand new flats and raise building heights to as much as 13
storeys is completely unacceptable.
I will be fighting strongly against these plans. They violate a
long list of crucial planning rules. The surrounding suburban
area is largely made up of homes of just one or two storeys. 13
storey tower blocks should have no place in Barnet's low-rise
suburban neighbourhoods. Many of my constituents are appalled by
what Comer Homes want to do. I'm not surprised. So am I. I will
do whatever I can to try to stop this from going ahead.
Residents have my full support."
After
many years of controversy, in January 2020 the Government's
Secretary of State
over-ruled everyone and allowed the development of 1,350 homes
on
the site, including buildings up to nine storeys high.
This is despite campaigns by local residents, Chipping Barnet's
MP,
local ward Councillors,
Barnet Council's planners, the London Assembly Member for Barnet
and
Camden, and the Mayor of London all opposing planning permisson
on the
grounds that there would be too many homes, and the high-rise
tower
blocks would be inappropriate near the surrounding two storey
houses
and bungalows.
And of course the residents of this new town will probably try
to
commute into London somehow, on the tubes trains and buses which
are
already overcrowded during peak times, or along the narrow roads
which
are gridlocked. And they will compete with existing residents
for school places for their children, GPs, hospitals, etc.
The decision of the (then) Secretary of State for Housing - Robert Jenrick - is final and cannot be appealed.
(the
photo is from the Barnet Times, click it to read the full
article)
This
website is my attempt to chart the New Southgate site's history
from
the days before STC first started to use it
until Nortel Networks bought it in 1991 then sold it in 2002.
And beyond - to be nosey about what happens to it in the future.
On
this
website we can have photos, descriptions, reminiscences, videos
and
even sounds if they exist!
Thanks to Rob White for maintaining this
site from 2002 to 2024