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Plans to build a new youth centre and synagogue with flats to help finance the scheme have been rejected.
Barnet councillors made the decision after town hall planning chiefs raised multiple concerns over the proposed development in Alba Gardens, Golders Green, which was designed to provide better facilities for the Jewish group Ezra Youth Movement.
Plans for the site involved demolishing the existing two-storey building used by the organisation to make way for a four-storey development containing a new youth centre and synagogue. On the second and third floors, the developer wanted to build three flats to help finance the scheme, while the top-floor flat would be occupied by the youth movement’s caretaker.
Barnet Council received 134 letters in support of the plans and one objection. But although planning officers supported upgrading the youth centre, they recommended the scheme for refusal when it was presented to a planning committee meeting on Wednesday.
Outlining their concerns, officers said it would be an overdevelopment, fail to provide enough private amenity space and overlook neighbours. They also criticised the lack of a travel plan and a failure to show the scheme would not lead to an “unacceptable” loss of daylight and sunlight.
Planning chiefs added that the applicant had not provided a financial viability report to show that the flats were necessary. An officer told the meeting: “We are not convinced that any residential development is required for the delivery of the community centre here on site.”
Speaking in support of the plans, Rabbi Yoni Golker told the committee the building was “urgently in need of modernisation” to create a “fit-for-purpose” youth centre and synagogue. Under questioning from councillors, he insisted the flats would “allow the sustainability of the youth movement for generations to come”.
Norman Bloom, a local resident, said neighbours believed the building was a…
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Source : times
