Redington Road braced for more builders as home with pool bids for go-ahead

Published: 17th March, 2011
by DAN CARRIER

NEIGHBOURS in Hampstead say their street has become a building site as major work is carried out on a series of homes.

Plans to build a new house with a basement swimming pool in Redington Road, Frognal, will go before Camden Council’s planning committee tonight (Thursday). 

This is the 18th time in two years planning applications for major work on the redbrick, late-Victorian houses have been submitted to the council. Actor John Alderton and his wife, actress Pauline Collins, have fought to maintain the existing character of the road in the face of the new developments. 

The couple have had to watch as neighbours on one side of their house built two new homes – and now the same is happening on the other side.

Redington Road resident Peter Gorb said: “We have been living in a road that resembles a building site for the past two years. It is actually quite incredible the number of planning applications that have gone in. 

“I feel extremely sorry for the immediate neighbours, who have already had to put up with lots of building works.”

The latest planning application would involve demolishing an existing house, dating from about 1900, and building a modern version of the same design. Planning officers’ advice is to approve the proposals. 

The Redington and Frognal conservation area advisory committee has told the council it feels the new building is “overdevelopment”. 

It fears the basement could cause flooding. Its views have been underlined by the Heath and Hampstead Society, which says the proposed new building is of “mediocre” design. 

Architects’ plans show that the new basement, cut into a hill, includes a swimming pool, parking spaces for at least two cars and a bicycle store. A first-floor layout includes quarters for servants.

Architect Dusan Savic said the basement plans had been fully explored and thoroughly drawn up to make sure they would cause no damage to other houses. 

He added: “We have done a study that is 200 pages long. We have used both structural and geo-technical engineers. We have met with the neighbours and tried to address their concerns. The client lives in the area and loves it.”