The 3 Northcote Ward Councillors have written the following letter to the Planning Dept - and they could do with some NappyValley support in the fight against this enormous advertising hoarding in the centre of the Junction. (there's another one planned outside ASDA but as thats not the heart of the historic junction, its probably a fight not worth fighting...)

Planning application 2013/4604
Digital Advertising Display Unit (Clapham Junction)
We are writing to object to the above planning application as we believe the proposed location is inappropriate for a display hoarding of this scale, measuring as it does 6m high by 3m wide with the surrounding structure reaching 8.4m in height. Such a unit will seriously impact the visual amenity of the Clapham Junction town centre.
The town centre is a designated Conservation Area with many notable features including the nearby Grade II listed buildings of the Falcon PH and the former Arding & Hobbs department store (now Debenhams). The overall town centre is described in the Council’s Conservation Area Appraisal document as being
“… generally a high quality commercial centre containing a high proportion of valuable Victorian and Edwardian buildings all of which make a positive contribution to the historic and architectural character of the conservation area. (Para 6.1)”.

Further, the quality of the public realm is described as being important to the area
“… to provide an appropriate setting to the buildings as well as a high quality environment for pedestrians. There are opportunities to enhance the character and appearance of streets by improving the quality of the experience for pedestrians as well as improving its visual character by removing extraneous clutter, rationalizing signing, and by providing good quality materials for surface finishes and well-designed street furniture. (Para 6.8)”.

We believe that the changes being brought about by the “exemplar” scheme are consistent with the aspirations of the Conservation Area appraisal and will result in significant improvements to the public realm of the town centre. However we are of the opinion that the installation of a large digital display unit would run counter to these aspirations and would negate recent improvements in the area.

The unit will adversely affect the free movement of pedestrians; introduce large scale signage which is out of keeping with the surrounding environment and has the potential to distract motorists who are negotiating a complex and busy junction thereby worsening highway safety.
We endorse the comments of the Clapham Junction Town Centre Partnership Board as expressed in their objection to this application. In particular we support the wish of the businesses to use the extended paved area as a central focus for future town centre events.
Therefore we would ask that this planning application be refused.
Yours sincerely,

Jenny Browne Peter Dawson Martin Johnson
Councillors for the Northcote Ward
Wandsworth Borough Council

Any show of support by objecting to the Planning Appllication has to be in by the 23rd October.

[url]http://planning.wandsworth.gov.uk/WAM/showCaseFile.do?appType=planning&appNumber=2013/4604[/url]

Just done my bit too, let's see if we can get some more objections

Just done my bit - only took 3 minutes. :D

I have done my good citizen bit and written an objection on the wandsworth site, only took 5 minutes and it is better than regretting not doing it when the board goes up.
Democracy.. let's hope so

No problem Supergirl, the site for comments is here:

http://planning.wandsworth.gov.uk/WAM/showCaseFile.do?appType=planning&appNumber=2013/4604


The business network has objected as follows:

The Partnership Board would like to register its objection to application 2013/4604 on the grounds that:

It would undo the effect of the Exemplar scheme in the central town centre as the proposed structure is intrusive; is detrimental to the visual amenity of the Victorian architecture of the town centre and could compromise highway safety at an extremely busy junction used by pedestrians as well as vehicles.

When the Exemplar scheme was initially presented to the Board the wide pavement area in that location was presented as an area which would provide a much needed central point in the town centre (e.g. for a Christmas Tree, switch-on ceremonies, gathering point for launches etc). The need for such a space is something which also featured in the recent Town Centre Visioning exercise;

Board Members were surprised at this proposal in the middle of the Town Centre Visioning Exercise, as they freely gave a great deal of their time to the initiative, and this proposal seemed to ignore the exercise.

Hi Jonathan

Can you send a link to the application (and even draft an objection that can be cut and paste?)

I think this is dreadful...

Planning application 2013/4604

Digital Advertising Display Unit (Clapham Junction)

As Chair of the Northcote Business Network I get to see all sorts of weird and wonderful planning applications but this one really does take the biscuit.
The council has just spent hundreds of thousands of pounds de-cluttering streets, re-surfacing St Johns Road and replacing all the pavements outside Clapham Junction & St Johns Road. Following these long overdue improvements there has been a planning application registered to erect a giant 8.4 metre high x 3 metre wide digital advertising hoarding outside Revolution (opposite Debenhams).

The best bit though is that the land is looked after (and therefore the planning application is effectively issued) by guess who…? Yup, WANDSWORTH COUNCIL

If like the business network you have feelings about this application please do feel free to visit the Wandsworth Council planning website and let them know. It’s worth knowing that if you intend to object to the application, the only grounds you can do so are on the basis of “visual amenity” and “highway safety”.

Many thanks,

Jonathan
Hamptons International
98-100 Northcote Road