Councillors still not listening in North Kensington...

The unpaid members of the great Cheesecake Consumer’s Architectural Advisory Panel are always the in line for lucrative Council commissions. Thus it was that John McAslan and Partners came to prepare the feasibility study of how to fit the Kensington Academy onto the unsuitable Lancaster West Estate.

They duly came up with a range of possibilities, somehow managing to promote the one option preferred by the Cheesecake Connoisseur that coincidentally is also the worst possible option for the residents of that benighted Estate. This option sites the Academy right next to a tower block, ensures that residents will get the full force of all the noise generated by school activities every single day of every single term and moves what will be left of an already meagre amount of green open space slap bang into permanent shade.

Consultation on the Supplementary Planning Document has closed – and the Council is now mulling over how best to tell all those who sent in over 400 thoughtful comments why it intends to ignore them all and develop the project exactly as Cllr. Moylan first thought of it.

Many respondents welcomed the Academy and others opposed it, but nobody – except Cllr. Moylan - wanted the traffic-laden new road that will cut the Estate in half and join up two erstwhile tranquil residential neighbourhoods. The Council will respond that this road will be “pedestrian dominated”. Well, only until drivers realise that it will make an excellent short cut between Ladbroke Grove and Royal Crescent and turn it into a very busy rat run. And don’t forget, under Council practice, at least three children will have to be killed or seriously injured before the Council’s original promise of a road only for pedestrians and cyclists will even be considered.

Still, the project got a big boost the other weekend when David Cameron himself said he “might” send his children to the new Academy. Now we all know this is not going to happen – but it gives Cllrs. Cockell and Moylan a great big PR boost to their pet project. There is a very faint possibility that Nancy could be sacrificed on the altar of political correctness and sent for a while to the Chelsea Academy before joining brother Arthur at Eton when she reaches the Sixth Form. But there is no chance whatsoever of her going to the Kensington Academy. This would put her in the same school as those children whom her parents carefully avoided when they sent their offspring to join those of Michael Gove MP and Ed Vaizey MP at the highly selective “state” primary school, St. Mary Abbots – the very fashionable Church of England school where all pupils are hand-picked to ensure that the hoi polloi are excluded.

And just consider what little money is to be spent on the Kensington Academy – a mere £17.6 million from the government and a further £1 million from the Academy’s sponsor, Rod Aldridge. The Chelsea Academy cost over £43 million and the re-built Holland Park School is likely to come in at over £80 million. So yet again, North Kensington gets the dregs from the rich man’s table!

Perhaps the problem stems from the planning consultation meeting, where one Council official told a woman who said she was stressed about the project that she could commit suicide if she wanted to, threatened to punch another objector in the face and then stormed off into the night. But this unprofessional behaviour pales into insignificance compared to the cowardice of the councillors themselves – Moylan and Cockell – who refuse point blank to talk directly to the good folk of Lancaster West and explain why their Estate has been singled out for this development. Their latest excuse is that this is now a government project and it has nothing to do with them!

Yet again, Cheesecake-man will get his way and impose a cheap and shoddy school on the unsuspecting families of North Kensington. The quality of life of Lancaster West residents will worsen forever, the Leisure Centre the Council said was no longer fit for purpose won’t be rebuilt, the wonderful green oasis that is Lancaster Green will be wantonly destroyed and a new rat run will put innocent children’s lives at risk every day. 

The people of North Kensington deserve better than this.

The powers that be should hang their heads in shame.