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9:02am Wednesday 18th March 2009 in
SIX prefab homes on an estate have been given listed status - a move which could scupper demolition plans.
The homes on Persant Road in Catford’s Excalibur estate have been given Grade II status by the Government’s Department for Culture Media and Sport.
Grade II listings are viewed to be of special interest, warranting every effort to preserve them.
Lewisham Council, which owns 80 percent of the estate, wanted to hand over the estate to London and Quadrant housing associatin.
The site would then be redeveloped to bring the houses up to Decent Homes Standard - a Government benchmark for the quality of housing.
But residents on the estate, which contains 187 pre-fabricated homes and a prefab church built by German PoWs in the 1940s, had been divided over the plans.
The Worried Tenants Group was set up three years ago to fight the demolition.
Jim Blackender, 55, a group member who lives on the estate in Pelinore Road, said: “We’re very pleased at the news but for us it’s just another rung on the ladder.
“Until the entire estate gets some sort of protection we won’t rest.
“If people don’t stand up and fight for their heritage there’ll be nothing left.”
He said: “The listings prove the historic importance of the rest of the prefabs too.
“We say this gives us the recommendation we need to push forward now for a conservation area on the whole estate.”
But Kay Sim, 63, who has lived in Mordred Road for 21 years, said: “I’m not happy.
“A lot of people now are really getting fed up. If this had not kicked off we could be well on our way by now.
“The people that wanted listed buildings should go and live in them.
“In five or six years time we’ll all sitting in our nice and cosy new houses while there’s are falling down around their ears.”
Ms Sim says the homes are difficult to keep warm and are in a poor state of repair.
She said: “I’ve had more water inside than there’s been rain outside.
“I just want out as quick as I can go and to get somewhere warm.”
English Heritage had recommended 21 of the homes for listing by the department but only six were listed by the department because they were in the "least-altered portion" of the estate.
The department also praised Excalibur as "the largest surviving post-war prefab estate in England", deemed to be of historic importance and special archaelogical interest.
Councillor for Whitefoot ward Cllr Daniel Houghton said: “It throws a bit of a spanner in the works in terms of trying to redevelop the estate.
“What we want is for London and Quadrant to go away and be as quick as possible in coming up with some revised plans.”
A spokesman for Lewisham Council said: “The council is in the process of contacting residents who live in these newly listed buildings, to discuss the impact of the listing status and what it will mean to them in terms of work they can or cannot carry out on their properties.”
Comments(3)
jim-999
says...
12:34am Thu 26 Mar 09
knockem down
says...
10:45pm Wed 1 Apr 09
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knockem down says...
1:23pm Tue 24 Mar 09
They say that they are trying to retain a selective individual community on a crime free estate, whereas the reality is the worried tenants group is tearing the community apart and being the only ones on this estate dishing out any crime by means of bullying and abusive behaviour against the very community that they are claiming to be fighting on behalf of.
There is a vast majority of homes on this estate that the so called management have avoided spending ANY money on by means of repair, these homes and the health of many residents have suffered due to this. This entire estate deserve to have a good quality ,warm and dry damp free home to live in, especially due to the conditions that we have all been forced to put up with over the many years. The bullying worried tenants group have only really been self minded within their own close knit group. concerns for the entire estate, YEAH, RIGHT. Dont make me laugh,, where were their concerns when they as an unelected
group went right behind every residents back and wrote to the DCMS and Heritage requesting listing on this entire estate. NOW, there is very little hope for those residents that shall remain in the selected prefabs while all around them they shall be seeing their neighbours moving into their brand new homes while they have to be forced to live in squalor. It is absolutely disgraceful. Every single one of these prefabs are not worth saving. The worried tenants group have even been crafty to the extent of going out of their way by visiting fresh new tenants and brain washing them to try their best to get them on their side to save the prefabs ... and so now some members of the worried tenants group who have only been here five minutes compared to other residents that have been here for many years are now on their side and shouting their foul mouthed remarks and demanding that we should all stand up to save this rotten , dilapidated estate with a split community ( because of the worried tenants group )
As a closing statement i just wish to say to the worried tenants group as they have abusively yelled and written in many statements to the decent residents on this estate, ( PUT UP AND SHUT UP ) you self minded bigots.