Former Royal Masonic Hospital site extents [Savills brochure]

The former Royal Masonic Hospital site, recently marketed by Savills as “a landmark development opportunity”, is currently under offer.  Sitting in a conservation area, surrounded by listed housing and overlooking Ravenscourt Park, the Grade II* hospital building and its later additions occupy a plum site in the heart of Hammersmith.

Royal Masonic Hospital – entrance hall
[Savills brochure]

Opened by King George V and Queen Mary in 1933, its steel-framed modernist architecture by Tait & Lorne famously won an RIBA Gold Medal as the best building of 1933, while its interiors, fixtures and fittings were custom designed throughout in the same Art Deco style.

But times changed, and after a controversial sale in the 1990s, although its Art Deco interiors continued to make frequent appearances in films and in television series like Poirot, subsequent owners proved unable to find a viable healthcare use. And after standing empty for 15 years, the main building will need considerable investment in refurbishment and restoration.

BFI RMH film [click to view]

A short promotional film made in 1970 gives us a fascinating glimpse into the hospital in its heyday. Fifty years ago, it was a self-contained organisation with its own kitchens, laundry, laboratories and a nursing school and staff accommodation, all set in 10 acres of immaculately kept grounds.

Royal Masonic Hospital [Freemasonry Today]

Following discussions with Council planners, the agents, Savills, are now saying that ‘medical use’ covenants need no longer apply and suggest a range of alternative possibilities for future development. Only the main building, with its twin entrance pillars representing Healing and Charity, is listed. The site also contains several smaller buildings which are described as targets for demolition and redevelopment – even “possible upward extensions”.

Any development on this scale and in this location will have a significant impact both on the park and the local community, so it is vital that we should all have a say in the future of this important part of our Hammersmith heritage.

Olympia, November 2021.  Click for super-size panorama

Anyone living near Olympia will be all too aware of the scale of the building works going on. When we first looked at the plans in late 2017,  we couldn’t envisage the true scale of the project.  At that time, the visualisations showed mezzanine decks added to the halls to increase floor area, and the rest were just outlines.  We’re now told that the mezzanines are not going to be built as exhibitors have shown a preference for more open floor area.  There are, after all, existing galleries around the halls.

Recently, the developers Yoo Capital/Future Olympia have invited the public to visit and overlook the site via the roof, as we advertised in our diary, the featured tour being led by construction director Tony Palgrave.  From Hammersmith Road one can see the huge steel structure supporting the Art Deco frontage, but what’s not so obvious is the size of the hole behind it.  The original building as you can see is now gone, but it had limited value having been chopped about for decades as previous owners tried to make it relevant, even becoming the “UKAY Olympia” furniture shop in the 1980’s.  The concrete is being ground up and recycled for the new buildings, a modern way to reduce waste, but not perhaps as green as some might have it, due to limited re-use of the embodied carbon.

Olympia roof – music venue in distance

The music venue at the rear of the site (shown adjacent in the distance with white crane alongside) is now built to it’s final height and the foundations for the theatre in front if it are now being built (far right of the main panorama); this will be followed by the foundations for the offices that will appear behind and above the Deco frontage over the next year or two. The proposed phased opening will be in 2024-5.

Olympia model 2021

The model on display in the Pillar Hall where the tour started, which we first saw at our AGM in 2019, shows the scale of the development, with the theatre frontage onto Hammersmith Road to the left of the office block behind the Deco frontage. Committee members have been active in helping to improve the theatre frontage and public realm by meeting periodically with the developers over the last 2 or 3 years.

We mentioned the government’s long-awaited Heat and buildings strategy in the article about Zero carbon homes a couple of months ago. Now published ahead of COP26, the direction of travel is a little clearer. Here we summarise what it says, looking at how it will affect you and your decisions as your existing heating system reaches end of life – we’re not looking at standards for newbuilds here – they have their own paths.  A third-party summary written by Building Design is a useful primer along with a cautionary reader comment from Finland highlighting the intricacies of vapour barriers when adding new insulation inside or out.  A recent Guardian article usefully lays out the “hydrogen landscape” and the ongoing tests.

Key points

The strategy says many good things, with good aspirations, but the thing that really stands out for existing homeowners is that a hydrogen infrastructure remains a work-in-progress. The issue is still: Can it be made economically and ecologically “at scale”, and deployed using existing gas mains? The government has said it needs more time to run research projects and decide – another 5 years. Can the climate wait ?

As we said previously, the heat-pump route is more involved, and has more finely tuned parameters for success.  You might therefore want to nurse that old boiler gently into its dotage until the infrastructure research is done, because a replacement hydrogen boiler (already designed with prototypes available from, for example, Worcester-Bosch, with a negligible cost premium) would be a trivial replacement by comparison, especially in a typical Hammersmith period home.  Installation of so-called hydrogen-ready boilers could be a way to prime the pump for a national switchover, like the switch from town gas from 1967 – 77.

If you’re interested in a no-nonsense discussion between a boiler manufacturer involved in government-sponsored hydrogen trials, their ins and outs, plus heat pumps, and someone who’s actually installed both in the real world, then the video adjacent is for you. It should open your eyes to most issues homeowners are about to grapple with, and discusses many of the points here in more detail.

Melanie Whitlock receives  her card featuring 30 years of Awards

Our vice-chair, Melanie Whitlock and her family have recently decided to move to Edinburgh after living in Hammersmith for a long time, Melanie has been a stalwart of the Society for at least 38 years. She has been on the committee since the 1980’s, chairing the Society twice, with a long stint from 1984-1990 during which she created our Awards, and again from 2009-2012. She has in many ways been the backbone of the Society for nearly 40 years, a fact recognised in a civic honour in 2019.  We wish her the fondest of farewells.

You can read more about her time as Chair in two sections of the 50th anniversary review written at the end of her second tenure in 2012.  Our President, Prof. Hans Haenlein said a few words of appreciation at her recent leaving party, which are reproduced below:

Chairman Richard Winterton writes:

Melanie Whitlock has been one of the driving forces of the Hammersmith Society for over 30 years. 

The Hammersmith Society is a community amenity society which strives to protect and enhance the urban environment of Hammersmith: this ambition needs vigilance to keep abreast of the continual changes proposed for the borough, requiring time, tact and patience to meet with participants from the developer teams to negotiate the best way forward.

2021 Environment Award – Quaker Meeting House

Quaker meeting room 2

Quaker meeting plaque

Quaker meeting outside and garden

Quaker meeting wooden ceiling

Quaker meeting house frontage

245 Hammersmith Road landscaping

245 Hammersmith Road Plaza

245 Hammersmith Road Green Wall

Mission Hall, 1883-4, by H R Gough. 41 Iffley Road

Chainman Richard Winterton & committee

Sherry Dobbin of FutureCity

Environment Award 2021 – Quaker Meeting House – Mayor + Stewart Dodd

Conservation Award 2021 – Mission Hall – Neil Davies Architects, HUT Architecture

Nancye Goulden Award 2021 – 245 Hammersmith Rd – Mayor +Sheppard Robson + Exterior Architecture

Summary

Our Guest Speaker was Sherry Dobbin, from FutureCity, who spoke about unlocking the potential of city places with some fascinating ideas for how this might work for Hammersmith Town Centre.  She showed several existing examples from around the world and an installation opened at The Shard on the same day.

Our Environment Award was given to The Quaker Meeting House in Bradmore Park Road.  We first visited as it was completed in October 2020, and were immediately impressed with the quality of design and construction, its environmental credentials, and the feeling of serenity. Our original article is here 

The Tom Ryland Award for Conservation was given to the Mission Hall in Iffley Road which has now been given a new lease of life through a major conversion and refurbishment to provide office, meeting and community facilities.

The Nancye Goulden Award was given to the landscaping of 245 Hammersmith Road. The unusual stairs & inclined lift immediately set it out as something different.  The landscaping and recreational benefits provided by this very substantial development set a great example of how we can restore people priority in the bustle of traffic and commerce which makes up the town centre.

Wooden spoons were awarded to two utilitarian horrors – 5G masts and their associated street clutter, and the ugly Thames Water fountains.

After the Awards, we turned to our usual AGM business, including Chairman’s report. Finally we reminded all present that in 2022, as our new banner and anniversary logo shows, the Society turns 60.  We are seeking ideas to celebrate the occasion next summer – please send us your thoughts.

Bridge pedestal grit blasted

The bridge reopened on the 17th July to some small fanfare. This was after the council’s appointed engineers had blast cleaned the cast iron pedestals so that they could be fully examined for cracks, and the case for continued safe operation could be made. 

There are cracks evident in all pedestals to a lesser or greater degree, but they are now assessed as not being critical to structural integrity, provided that the pedestals are not overstressed, which means minimising the movement of the chains that run over them.

Chain heating arrangement (pedestal within housing)

Bridge Chain heater

The temporary solution, which allows the current limited use by pedestrians and bikes, is to heat or cool the chains that run over the pedestals to maintain temperature, so as to keep them in approximately the same place avoiding excess pedestal stress.  This is obviously a 24×7 energy-intensive business, a least-worst solution for the time-being.  It’s worth noting that even with only pedestrians and bikes crossing, the bridge still sways a little, it is very much a live structure.  The current and much reduced-cost proposal for shoring up the bearings on top of the pedestals (“stabilisation works”) is to replace them with elastomeric sliding bearings, at a total cost of around £6m as widely reported, a figure that doesn’t seem unreasonable.  Others can judge whether this is a good enough solution for the long term.  We’d prefer to be without the nagging doubts of the hidden cast iron bolted-in parts in critical structural positions, to allow the engineering of a robust 100-year + solution using easily replaceable bearings. This wouldn’t be expensive in the scale of the total repair bill, and as we described early this year, fixing the recurring problem effectively for good.

Without going into further exhaustive detail, which can be found in the references listed below, the main issue remains who will pay for the repairs. The most sensible option is to substantially dismantle the existing bridge with the COWI-Foster structure, or other temporary bridge in place for the duration. This would allow it to be properly repaired to a higher quality than can be achieved onsite, including replacing the troublesome cast iron, and might be quicker overall.  Consideration should also be given to lightening the structure via a lighter/improved roadway as we’ve mentioned before, so as to lower bridge loadings, potentially raise capacity a little, and we’d very much like to see wider pathways for pedestrians & bikes.

The latest update from the Task Force shows that our council leader and the newly re-appointed government minister responsible, Baroness Vere, are again at loggerheads, this time over the relatively small sum of £6m for stabilisation works, which is why they haven’t started.  If they can’t agree on this, how ever will they agree on the £100m+ full repair bill ?  We call for a ceasefire and end to hostilities by letter.

References

• Bridge Task Force documents
• New Civil Engineer – bridge reopening 
• H&F Bridge page including letters to and fro.
• Barnes Village Bugle (August) with significant detail and discussion of the proposed ferry, now mothballed.

King St. “CS9” as proposed in 2018

Over the last year or so, we’ve been participating in the Council’s resident-led  Cycling & Walking Commission, via our membership secretary, along with residents including representatives of one or two affected resident’s associations, such as affiliates SPRA & SBRA.

Due to the pandemic, meetings were held as online workshops, the process being chaired by Cllr. Iain Cassidy, and facilitated by the council’s preferred consultants, WSP, who provided expert guidance and showed design options used elsewhere in the UK and Europe. We heard from several special interest groups including disabled cycling group Wheels for Wellbeing.

Summary

• A two-way temporary cycleway named CW9 is to be built along Hammersmith Road / King St including replacing older track on the right in the one-way part of King St.
• The design is similar to Chiswick CW9 “temporary” scheme including bus bypasses.  A halfway-house one-way wand scheme is currently being deployed as a step to the “temporary” two-way scheme.
• Our preferred A4 route is not being actively pursued currently. Any “permanent” scheme, like the original “CS9” is now unfunded.
• The design favours cycling at the unnecessary expense of pedestrians and busses – as a result we have accessibility, safety and increased pollution concerns – this doesn’t appear to be a fair and equitable solution for Hammersmith.
• The E-Scooter Trial is an independent activity – TfL and DfT to review results.

Terms of Reference

Modal Share 2019
All London : Inner London has significantly lower car use. (Source TfL)

In common with TfL’s leanings, most discussion was around cycling, with a healthy proportion of commissioners chosen for those credentials, despite the clue in the name (and Terms of Reference) Cycling and Walking Commission, we therefore felt the need to keep walking and other users on the agenda as (almost) everyone walks if they can, and the number of journeys by foot + bus represents at least 40% of all journeys.  As shown, walking represents a 25% “modal” share, but is often the Cinderella of the show by needing no specific new infrastructure – or does it ? 

OPDC local plan

A further consultation stage ended on 5 July. This was made necessary because the Car Giant section of the OPDC area was ruled to be “undevelopable” for the duration of the Plan (as a result of no agreement with Car Giant) – so the quantum of development has to be shifted to the west of the area.

Our member Henry Peterson, on behalf of a coalition of local groups and civic societies, is maintaining that this should require a new Draft Plan, but the Inspector is unlikely to agree. The following is Henry’s synopsis of the case against the Plan, with any references referring to sections of the plan available here :

• With a continuing pandemic, 2021 is not the time to fix in place a Local Plan for one of the last large areas of largely undeveloped land in London.   Much is changing, in London’s population trends, commuting patterns, and the type of housing in which people want to live.
• The changes made to the 2018 version of the Local Plan are not small ones.  Entirely new locations have been earmarked for high density and high rise housing.  OPDC claim in its consultation material that ‘most of the Plan remains the same’. As a result, many local people have not caught up with the fact that proposals dating from 2018 are being substantially altered.
• New plans for Channel Gate with high density, high rise inserted into existing low rise residential areas have been inadequately consulted on and should not be introduced via a ‘modification’ at this late stage, ref MM/PS2/OPDC/P9/1
• OPDC continues to say that these locations for high density housing will be ‘well connected’.  In many cases this is not true.  With no new Overground or Underground stations, as originally proposed, these locations are poorly served by public transport – check the PTAL ratings. Extra buses on roads heavily congested are not much help. MM/PS2/OPDC/SP/25 and MM/PS2/OPDC/T/1
• The modified Plan does nothing to join up the existing residential areas on the west and east side of the Scrubs, for the next 20 years.   We are left with east-west connections through Harlesden or south of the Scrubs at Du Cane Road. Major Modification Figure/PS2/OPDC/PM2
• High density housing which is ‘car-free’ does not mean ‘vehicle free’.  This Plan does not reflect the rapid changes taking place on online sales and delivery traffic.
• High rise housing is not what many people want or need in 2021 onwards, given a cladding scandal and the risks of further future lockdowns.  Lifts and social distancing do not combine well.
• The 2018 Draft included a ‘major town centre’ at Old Oak North on the Car Giant land. This 2021 version refers at various points to ‘parts of a major town centre’.   The location of Channel Gate for ‘major town centre uses’ is not convincing.   North Acton is now largely redeveloped but attracts only fast food and chain café outlets aimed at students and a transient population. MM/PS2/OPDC/SP/19 and MM/PS2/OPDC/SP/14 6a.

More on the Old Oak Neighbourhood Forum to which Henry contributes.