£4.5bn Brent Cross revamp is set to shrink

Scaled down: how Brent Cross could have looked with the 7,500 new homes
13 April 2012

Boris Johnson is set to tear up a massive regeneration scheme in London in a bid to spark new life into Brent Cross shopping centre.

The Mayor is considering whether to "de-couple" the plans to revamp Britain's oldest mall from the wider 20-year regeneration of Cricklewood.

The £4.5 billion plan gained outline planning permission in 2010 and would have involved building 7,500 homes, rebuilding three schools and moving Cricklewood station closer to Brent Cross. Developers claimed it would create 27,000 jobs as part of a £1 billion package of community benefits.

But Mr Johnson has been warned that the current shortage of development finance would make it impossible to get it off the ground. He has now agreed to investigate whether shopping centre owners Hammerson Plc and Standard Life Investments can defer their wider community regeneration pledges or submit a new planning application simply to improve the retail outlets.

Mr Johnson met key figures at Brent Cross last week and one source told the Standard that the wider Cricklewood regeneration scheme was now "dead in the water". The Mayor is now thought to favour concentrating efforts on what would be dubbed Brent Cross "town centre", the mall, which opened in 1976, and the retail park on the opposite side of the North Circular, in the face of competition from Westfield.

Brian Coleman, the Tory London Assembly member for Barnet and Camden, said: "I welcome this. I have always supported Brent Cross's expansion - it's long overdue.

"The original scheme was for thousands of Hobbit houses and would have been a disaster."

Mike Freer, the Tory MP for Finchley and Golders Green, who campaigned for the wider application when he was Barnet council leader,added: "I'm quite happy with the expansion of the shopping centre because it's important for the local economy in terms of jobs."

Sarah Teather, the Liberal Democrat MP for Brent Central, said: "If there are going to be major changes to the current plans it is vitally important that they are published and local residents are consulted."

The scheme - said to be the biggest in London outside the Olympics - attracted more than 500 objections, with many fearing more congestion on the North Circular.

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