{"id":204,"date":"2013-02-13T16:19:34","date_gmt":"2013-02-13T16:19:34","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/?p=204"},"modified":"2013-03-19T17:57:25","modified_gmt":"2013-03-19T17:57:25","slug":"our-legal-case-against-hammersmith-fulham-council","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/?p=204","title":{"rendered":"Our legal case against Hammersmith &#038; Fulham Council"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>The series of\u00a0posts below explain that our residents association is continuing to prepare a judicial review application, challenging the decisions of Hammersmith and Fulham to issue a planning permission for the second phase of the Imperial West development.<\/p>\n<p>The planning application was approved by the council&#8217;s Planning Applications Committee on July 25th 2012.\u00a0 Six months of negotiations between Imperial College and the council then followed.\u00a0 The planning permission was issued on December 21st.<\/p>\n<p>We are asking local residents and businesses to contribute to our legal costs.\u00a0 Having raised \u00a32,500 previously from amongst our 280 members (a sum which was then matched by the Kensington Society) we are concentrating this time on the households that will be most affected by the Imperial West development.\u00a0 These are the houses in Oxford Gardens, and the southern ends of Wallingford Road, Finstock Road, Balliol Road, and Wallingford Avenue.<\/p>\n<p>We ask all these households to think what the development will mean for the daily views they have of their streets, and from their windows, and what they are willing to contribute to try to force a rethink on the proposals.\u00a0 If the planning approval was quashed by the courts, the current politicians in charge of the council may have second thoughts.\u00a0 And the May 2014 Borough elections are not that far away.<\/p>\n<dl id=\"attachment_206\" class=\"wp-caption alignleft\" style=\"width: 293px;\">\n<dt class=\"wp-caption-dt\"><a href=\"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/Imperial-West-visualisation-from-Oxford-Gardens-W101.jpg\"><img loading=\"lazy\" class=\" wp-image-206\" title=\"Imperial West visualisation from Oxford Gardens W10\" src=\"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/Imperial-West-visualisation-from-Oxford-Gardens-W101-286x300.jpg\" alt=\"\" width=\"283\" height=\"320\" \/><\/a><\/dt>\n<dd class=\"wp-caption-dd\">How the development will look from Oxford Gardens<\/dd>\n<\/dl>\n<p>As a first stage in a Judicial Review, our lawyers sent to the council last month a &#8216;Letter Before Action&#8217;.\u00a0 This sets out two grounds, as advised by a leading planning QC, which render the council&#8217;s decision potentially unlawful.<\/p>\n<p>The council has since replied to this letter and this response is being reviewed by our lawyers.<\/p>\n<p style=\"text-align: left;\">The grounds for judicial review are that:<\/p>\n<ul>\n<li>\n<div style=\"text-align: left;\">the council erred in law in giving any weight to the emerging White City Opportunity Area Planning Framework<\/div>\n<\/li>\n<li>the council acted unlawfully by granting planning permission for a development which is in conflict with is Core Strategy policy on affordable housing, without any or any adequate reasons and having misdirected itself as to the correct meaning of policy.<\/li>\n<\/ul>\n<p>The details of our claim are at this link <a href=\"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/Willmot-Dixon-Letter-before-Action.pdf\">Webster Dixon Letter before Action<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>Local residents may be familiar with the long history of the White City Opportunity Area Planning Framework.\u00a0 More background is on our campaign website at <a href=\"http:\/\/www.imperialfolly.org.uk\">www.imperialfolly.org.uk<\/a>.\u00a0\u00a0 In a nutshell, the council intended to have this &#8216;strategic planning framework&#8217; in place <strong>before it <\/strong>considered the Imperial West application.\u00a0 But it has never republished the draft version, let alone gone through the necessary statutory consultation process before adopting this document as part of its planning policies.<\/p>\n<p>Many believe that this 18 month delay in republishing the WCOAPF\u00a0results from the case that the council lost in the courts in March 2012, when its decision to adopt a similar document for Shepherds Bush Market was ruled unlawful in the <a href=\"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/Wakil.pdf\">Wakil<\/a>\u00a0case.\u00a0 The challenge to the Imperial West decision is not a first for the council.\u00a0 Other decisions on the proposed developments at Earls Court and Shepherds Bush Market are also being challenged through the courts.<\/p>\n<p>Please help with whatever contribution you can make.\u00a0 This legal battle is not just about the Imperial West development, but also the future of the whole area to the west of the Borough boundary.\u00a0 This includes the Helical Bar proposals on Wood Lane (with a second 32 storey tower proposed) and which Hammersmith &amp; Fulham are about\u00a0 to decide on.\u00a0\u00a0 The council has pushed the boundaries of the planning system too far in recent years, and only concerted action by the public will ensure that its planning juggernaut is stopped in its tracks.<\/p>\n<p><a href=\"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/White-City-no1.tif\"><img class=\"alignleft size-full wp-image-209\" title=\"\" src=\"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/wp-content\/uploads\/2013\/02\/White-City-no1.tif\" alt=\"\" \/><\/a><\/p>\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>The series of\u00a0posts below explain that our residents association is continuing to prepare a judicial review application, challenging the decisions of Hammersmith and Fulham to issue a planning permission for the second phase of the Imperial West development. The planning &hellip; <a href=\"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/?p=204\">Continue reading <span class=\"meta-nav\">&rarr;<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"open","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":[],"categories":[1],"tags":[],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204"}],"collection":[{"href":"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcomments&post=204"}],"version-history":[{"count":7,"href":"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":216,"href":"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=\/wp\/v2\/posts\/204\/revisions\/216"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fmedia&parent=204"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Fcategories&post=204"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"http:\/\/sthelensresidents.org.uk\/index.php?rest_route=%2Fwp%2Fv2%2Ftags&post=204"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}