Fight the Height, Walthamstow: Sunday 1 June, 2008
In 1999 Waltham Forest council demolished a large site at the east end of Walthamstow High Street and on Hoe Street. An arcade of shops was built through the block between the two streets in the 1960s and the site was known as the Arcade site.
The area had been heavily bombed in the war and the post-war buildings on the site were of no particular architectural merit but they were home to many small local shops remembered fondly by local residents, as well as some council flats on the second and third floors above them. Waltham Forest council are blamed for failing to properly maintain the properties resulting in their deterioration.
When demolition took place in 1999, the council announced their intention to put the site to cultural use and benefit the community – a new leisure centre, library and arts centre together with social housing. But for some years this was an empty square with a path across. But developer St Modwen published its proposals for the site in 2008 they appeared to be dominated by commercial interest and to have little regard for local needs.
The Arcade site was at the east end of Walthamstow’s famous street market, claimed to be the longest in Europe which began in 1885 and attracts shoppers from across London and tourists from around the world. St Modwen’s plans included a large Primark supermarket which would threaten the future of the market and many of the shops along the high street.
Then there was the Vue multiplex cinema which would put an end to any chance of the restoration of the Grade II* listed 1930 high Art-Deco Moorish style former Walthamstow Granada a few yards away on Hoe Street.
In the 2008 plans was an 18 storey tower block, quite out of scale with the surrounding area, with its terraces of two storey housing and small scale developments. It was this that led those protesting to call their campaign ‘Fight The Height‘.
Flats in this tower block would be highly attractive to well-paid city workers, just a short walk from Walthamstow Central station with its 4 trains an hour to Liverpool Street in 17 minutes as well as a frequent Victoria Line service to the West End.
Considerable thought had gone into the protest to attract publicity for the campaign. There were three characters representing the tower block, Vue cinema and Primark who bravely stood in front of the hoardings with the large coloured computer generated images of the proposed development as the protesters pelted them with over-ripe tomatoes donated by market stall-holders. And it made the TV news.
There were also many large placards with adults and children carrying them, and local boy William Morris (1834-1896) born here in and celebrated in his childhood home now the William Morris Gallery in Lloyd Park) also put in an appearance. Morris in 1877 was one of the founders of the Society for the Protection of Ancient Buildings, often known by its nickname Anti-Scrape, a charity whose purpose remains ‘Heritage protection’.
And “local artists and non-artists” founded the Antiscrap campaign “against against the attacks on our culture by the local authority.” Originally formed to fight cuts in museum fnding, on their web site you can read more about the Arcade campaign and other campaigns about out-of-character local developments.
Protests like this one were probably important in leading St Modwen to revise their plans for the Arcade site.
Here is a post from Antiscrap on Thursday 22 November 2012:
The shocking news about the new Arcade site plans is that they’re not bad. No, really. Opinions differ as to whether it’s appropriate to build 120 new homes and a nine-screen cinema there at all. But the plans have been thoughtfully designed with good attention to detail and far less negative impact on central Walthamstow than previous plans.
http://www.antiscrap.co.uk/
But as a short visit to Walthamstow will show, some other campaigns in the area have met with rather less success, though the Granada has been saved and now hosts a theatre. There are now tower blocks clustered around various areas of the town – largely in easy walking distance from its stations – and the Ensign camera factory has been replaced by flats rather than rediscovered under its ugly 1980s cladding.
More at Fight the Height, Walthamstow.
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