DHL, Elizabeth Industrial Estate, Lewisham, London

The Elizabeth Industrial Estate was tired and run down and the proposal was to demolish it and start again. Whilst the application was acceptable in principle officers had concerns with the level of car parking and the layout. Despite having five different case officers over the lifetime of the application, as well as an urban design officer who left the Council half way through and was not replaced, we successfully resolved all of these points and gained unanimous approval at planning committee.

We advised the client to retain existing tenants in the units to ensure that the occupied floorspace could be discounted from the development’s CIL liability, thus reducing the liability to £0. The scheme was shortlisted for “UK Best Multi-let Industrial Estate” and the DHL relocation from the US Embassy site in Nine Elms was nominated for “Deal of The Year” by the IAS (the leading Industry body).