brentwood.gov.uk

Thank you for consulting Transport for London (TfL) on the Brentwood Borough Council, Draft Local Plan, Preferred Site Allocations document. The following comments represent the views of officers in TfL Commercial Development Planning Team (TfL CD) in its capacity as a significant landowner and are separate from any representations that may be made by TfL in its statutory role as the strategic transport authority for London.
TfL Commercial Development Property Development Team works to identify development opportunities throughout our landholdings. We work to unlock underutilised land through pursuing innovative solutions to enable development of our sites. We are committed to providing exemplary developments that will showcase the Mayors objectives of providing good growth. Within Brentwood TfL CD has identified a site within the borough with the potential for residential development which could make a significant contribution towards meeting borough and TfL housing targets.
Site Allocations
Brentwood railway station car park TfL CD strongly supports the draft allocation of the site for housing development. The site is a well contained underutilised site with excellent transport accessibility and should therefore be a focus for growth. TfL supports the suggested approach of producing a site specific development brief for the site and would wish to be involved in its preparation.
We note that the draft site allocation boundary does not include a section of car park towards the east. The attached plan represents the parcel of land within TfL's ownership for which we are exploring development feasibility, and which measures 1.39ha.
We note that the draft allocation includes the approximate capacity for 100 homes, which equates to an indicative net density of 104 dwellings per hectare. High level feasibility studies for this site indicate that a decked design could allow a greater density to be achieved on the site whilst still providing a compatible and neighbourly form of development. Taking into account the town centre location and prevailing form of development, we consider that the site could support a higher density form of development than that suggested.
The William Hunter Way car park proposed allocation includes the approximate capacity for up to 300 homes which equates to a net density of 245 dwellings per hectare. The background information sets out that viability analysis suggests that higher density residential development would be required to fund commercial and parking uses. If development at Brentwood railway station car park will need to re-provide existing commuter car parking, it is also highly likely that higher density residential development would be required to fund the additional infrastructure associated with parking uses.
As such we would suggest that the same logic with regards to density assumptions are applied to both William Hunter Way car park and Brentwood railway station car park. Given the above, the central and accessible location of the site, we consider that a 200-250 home figure would represent a more accurate representation of the sites likely indicative housing capacity.