Charles Wright: Can Square Mile tension between heritage and growth be eased?

A new skirmish in the war over development in the City of London seems to be breaking out – and not instigated by the usual “heritage lobby” suspects. This time it’s the City Corporation launching the attack, with the Historic England quango in its sights.

It isn’t holding back. Such heritage consultees were “too often” stalling projects with objections that were “haphazard, inconsistent and increasingly misaligned with the national imperative to drive growth” putting them “on the wrong side of history”, former Guildhall planning chair Shavran Joshi argued this month in separate Standard and Times articles.

“Senior planning officers” and “figures in the Corporation” were quoted too, accusing Historic England of standing in the way of the authority’s ambition to ensure London remains a global financial and professional services hub. Guildhall planning director Gwyn Richards spelt this out: “Persistent” Historic England objections were damaging investor confidence and appetite, he said. “As planners we know this from repeated developer feedback.”

Current City Corporation planning committee chair Tom Sleigh has been more emollient, expressing a desire for “constructive dialogue” with heritage lobbyists. But those “trying…too hard to prevent development and growth”, he told Building Design magazine, were at risk of being seen as “blockers at a critical time of national economic importance”. Developers have joined in. The Square Mile “cannot be preserved in aspic,” Ross Sayers, chair of the City Property Association (CPA), told The Times.

What’s going on, particularly as most tall buildings do get permission – 350,000 square metres-worth in the past 12 months? Isn’t Historic England, which, by law, must be consulted on major applications in London with heritage implications, simply doing its job?

There are 48 churches, 28 conservation areas and more than 600 listed buildings in the Square Mile. Historic street patterns remain amid the towers, and below ground there are extensive Roman remains. The discovery of some of these recently prompted a redesign of one of the latest office towers to be approved. Development in the City has an impact beyond its boundaries, too. We all care about that skyline. There’s clearly a role for a watchdog.

But in a continuing competition for international business, and demand for top-quality space outstripping supply, the City needs to keep building, the Corporation argues. Constrained by London-wide policy protecting views of St Pauls in particular, it is corralling major new building into the small “City cluster” zone of existing high-rise development – where the only way is up. The Guildhall wants another 1.2 million square metres of office space by 2040, and that inevitably brings conflict in what is the historic heart of the capital.

Hence the new skirmish: the Guildhall pushing for a “better balance” in planning policy between “preservation and progress”, giving more weight to developments driving growth, as Historic England warns of “severe harm” to important heritage sites. We need to get “comfortable” with “stone rubbing shoulders with steel” says Joshi, “without the worry of how the heritage lobby will judge us”.

Not everyone agrees that historic buildings sitting “cheek-by-jowl” with new buildings creates, in Joshi’s words, a “thrilling juxtaposition”. Planning inspector David Nicholson took on that argument when he considered the controversial Vegas-style Tulip tower in 2021. Juxtaposition was not always positive, he said, “particularly when…that was an assessment reached on balance.”

Earlier this month former Royal Academy chief Sir Charles Saumarez Smith, while accepting the need for the City to remain globally competitive, warned that the Guildhall’s big bet on continuing demand for “monolithic” offices was putting the area’s character at risk. “The pendulum needs to swing back,” he said.

Even the CPA, while supportive of the corporation’s approach, has reported workers’ views that the City’s public realm can feel “too polished”. It recommended the Guildhall to  embrace “greener, more characterful spaces to make the Square Mile feel more inviting and inclusive”.

This resonates with Sleigh’s view that the best developments “give something back to the street” –  “ground level activation”, in planning speak, as opposed to the ubiquitous tower-top “sky gardens”, which Sleigh suggested in his Building Design interview might be going out of fashion.

Sleigh isn’t backing down in the face of opposition to the Guildhall’s growth targets though. “We believe strongly that heritage and modernity can work alongside each other,” he told the CPA in June. “We will always robustly defend our positions when it comes to where growth should and must happen.” It looks like the stand-off isn’t abating.

Sir Sadiq Khan’s new London Plan seems to be in the Guildhall’s sights too, with the future of the capital’s Central Activities Zone (CAZ), including the Square Mile and the West End, at stake, according to Joshi. “If we give the CAZ the tools to grow, we’ll keep London ahead of global competitors like New York, Paris, Tokyo and Singapore,” he wrote in the Standard. The new London Plan is some way off, but Khan’s initial Towards a London Plan document does suggest the protected views policy might be reviewed to “ensure its impact is proportionate” – an early win for the Guildhall perhaps.

Is its message getting through to Historic England too? This week the watchdog said the City’s latest battleground proposal, Network Rail’s controversial scheme putting an office block above Liverpool Street station to fund improvements to the overcrowded terminus (pictured), was a “significant improvement” on previous plans. While advising councillors to grant permission only “if persuaded that harm has been minimised and would be outweighed by public benefits”, it is not lodging a formal objection.

Meanwhile though, a new Deloitte survey shows most of the new office space delivered in the City in the first half of this year was actually refurbishment rather than new build. With limited space to develop, continuing high costs, and new buildings taking some six years to complete, occupiers were “increasingly considering better-quality secondary space”. While the debate continues, the market itself might be embracing another approach to satisfying heritage lobbyists.

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