• THE protection of our existing buildings in Belsize is compromised by the continuing pressure for basement developments.

These should not essentially be a bad thing but in too many cases lead to damage to neighbouring properties and unreasonable disruption. There is one underlying cause for the difficulties.

Far too much reliance is given to the paperwork exercises at the planning stage and too little to the actual execution of the developments.

Camden, like many other boroughs, require a Basement Impact Assessment and Construction Management Plan to be included with any planning application.

While these should deal with the method of the building, the protection to the neighbouring properties and the effect of the work on the adjoining ground and water courses, in practice many of the issues that lead to damage are due to poor working practices. This aspect of construction is not sufficiently monitored.

One way to improve this would be to join up the construction criteria agreed at planning with the checking regime that the building control surveyors carry out.

Surely it makes sense to have qualified inspectors visit higher risk works on a regular basis with a view to spotting poor practice before problems occur.

On the very large basement projects the checking stage that is part of the planning process is also far from perfect. There is a common complaint from those potentially affected by much larger schemes such as the Royal Free Pears building and the Hall School development, that the checking by Camden’s appointed consultants, is too much of a tick-box exercise.

This has led to private groups funding expensive structural engineering checks themselves. This cannot be the fair way for the planning process to be run. The remit of Camden’s checking consultants should be reconsidered so as to remove this burden.

London, and especially this part, is already relatively dense and this trend will continue. It is imperative that the council react better to problems in both small and large building projects.

LEILA ROY
KIRSTY ROBERTS
STEVEN ADAMS
Belsize ward Conservative Team