Agar Grove Phase 1a and 1b

Planning History:
First pre-application meeting: May 2013 Full planning submission for all phases: December 2013 Planning permission with conditions: August 2014 Start on site Phase 1a: February 2016 Completion Phase 1a: May 2018 Start on site Phase 1b: August 2018 Completion Phase 1b: June 2021 Community and local residents have been actively engaged throughout the design process. Seven consultations were held on site and were open to all estate residents - including non-resident leaseholders, freeholders, and the occupants of their homes. These provided the opportunity to talk to the whole project team, including the council’s regeneration team, the architects, and all consultants.

Description of the design:
1.Agar Grove creates a legible development that re-integrates the estate back into the local urban fabric. 2.The site forms part of a walking neighbourhood which is well located, with access to shops, jobs, and social and community infrastructure. A café provides active frontage onto Agar Place. 3.Agar Grove is well served by public transport, and the new street layout prioritises cycle and walking routes in accordance with the Mayor of London’s Healthy Streets initiative. 4.Phases 1a and 1b are tenure-blind, providing 95 mixed tenure homes from flats and maisonettes to split-level homes. 5.This part of Camden is characterised by a diversity of housing types. An architectural approach and materials language draw on these characteristics in a modern-day interpretation, rooting the scheme in its context. Active frontages define the public square at Agar Place and the scheme’s central green space. 6.The scheme’s arrangement of blocks surrounding courtyards and gardens echoes the structure of the Camden Square Conservation Area. The linear layout adapts to the gradient of the site, achieving level access to all building entrances, and maximising solar orientation. 7.Well-defined, pedestrian friendly streets and open spaces bring greenery into the heart of the site, and support ‘Play on the Way’ initiatives. 8.Entrances are clearly defined. In Phase 1a, double height lobbies link through to a residents’ garden to the rear, assisting wayfinding and security. 9.People-focused Homezone streets allow safe play and socialising. A new ‘Green Street’ forms a key east-west cycle connection. One-way secondary streets minimise traffic. 10.No new car parking. 50 spaces (with 2 disabled spaces) are re-provided. 11.Amongst a range of green open spaces, a central garden is a well-overlooked and centralised, publicly accessible space. 12.Residents have private balconies, terraces or ground floor gardens, and communal courtyard gardens. Legible entrances (with concealed bin spaces) offer private defensible space.

Choose a few key elements you want to promote:
This pioneering regeneration for Camden Council improves the borough’s housing stock and addresses fuel poverty with a scheme that is on track to be the UK’s largest Passivhaus development. Homes are filled with daylight thanks to generous, double or triple aspect layouts, with split-levels offering flexibility between living spaces. All have been designed to better suit households for whom existing units are undersized and unfit for purpose. Framing a series of green spaces, Phase 1a and 1b weave into the neighbourhood, establishing key pedestrian and cycle connections and maximising relationships with the local urban fabric through carefully considered, active frontages.

SCHEME TAGS

Sustainability:
An innovative approach to sustainability underpins the design of Agar Grove, with a strategy that champions Passivhaus principles. With the project on track to be the largest Passivhaus scheme in the UK, homes are designed to minimise operational carbon emissions through a fabric first approach, reducing emissions while also confronting rising fuel poverty for residents. Passivhaus provides reliable low-energy ventilation, with a high-performance building fabric that uses significantly less energy for space heating than conventional construction. Following this demand-minimisation approach, space heating and domestic hot water is designed to be delivered efficiently with minimal losses, resulting in a 95% reduction in carbon consumption at Agar Grove. Passivhaus also provides improved internal comfort. Its focus on airtight and well-insulated buildings means that cold draughts are banished, and internal surfaces such as windows don’t radiate the cold. Homes in Phase 1a and 1b have achieved an air tightness of 0.3ACH @50 Pa – improving on the normal Passivhaus airtightness target by 50% – meaning homes have comfortable, stable temperatures inside. MVHR provides residents with tempered fresh air, so they are welcome to open or close windows for amenity without needing to do so for ventilation. The units are fitted with highly efficient heat exchangers, maximising energy recovery from stale air. A key benefit of the scheme’s approach to sustainability is its ability to address fuel poverty among its housing tenants - 10% of households in the UK suffer from fuel poverty, and Camden has some of the highest rates of poverty in London, with people having to choose between spending income on food or heating. To tackle this, and to provide dry, warm and energy-efficient homes for all tenants, all homes in Phase 1a and 1b are built to Passivhaus standards, which will cut energy use for heating and heating bills by up to 90%.

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