The 02 Centre: scheduled for redevelopment 

• IF Camden eventually approve the proposed O2 Centre development, it will end in catastrophe just like 100 Avenue Road (100AR) which is now a massive hole in the ground, (Town Hall planners told to get tough on O2 Centre’s developers, September 16).

Such extremely high-density, high-rise, high-cost housing is unsustainable without all the community facilities, services such as a health centre and retail outlets to support it.

We have already lost a garden centre and now Travis Perkins; we do not want to lose Homebase as well as Waterstones, the cinema and gym, not to mention the much needed Sainsbury’s.

Camden should begin by setting a limit on the height of any buildings to just six storeys and insist on 50 per cent social housing. Developers have a habit of whittling down the proportion of social housing to nothing over time, as they have done with 100AR.

A smaller scale project would be far less costly to build. The developers would do well to study and learn from the Alexandra and Ainsworth estate of high-density, low-rise housing designed by former borough architect, the late Neave Brown.

KATHARINE BLIGH
Chairwoman, Finchley Road & Kilburn Branch Labour Party