Campaigners opposed to the Castle and Fitzroy House demolition at the Town Hall

RESIDENTS are celebrating a temporary victory after a decision on whether a controversial office development can go ahead was postponed.

Clere Street, Paul Street, and Epworth Street residents gathered at the Town Hall on Tuesday evening with placards to protest against a new development. Lion Portfolio Ltd are proposing to demolish Castle and Fitzroy House, and replace it with an office block four storeys higher with two new basement levels.

Karen Albert, who has lived and worked in the area for 15 years, said: “We’re thrilled [about the postponement]. We feel like we’ve finally been listened to by the council.”

She added: “None of us want compensation from the developer. We love where we live, we want to stay where we are, we want to fight, and have something reasonable in its place.”

Residents argue the scheme would negatively impact the lives of disabled and elderly people in the supported housing block, and they estimate it would take 1.7 million trees planted to offset its carbon emissions.

Tony O’Loughlin, who lives in supported housing in Epworth Street, said: “We are 19 flats with a lot of disabled and elderly people in there. We’ve already put up with three years of another development at the back of us, which almost drove us insane, and now we’re going to get the same thing again.

“Everybody’s terrified. We had three years of thick, grey dust, and there’s a lot of us with bad health problems. We’re dreading this. We know it’s all about money – we [the residents] don’t come into it.”

Tony O’Loughlin

Sangna Chauhan, an Epworth Street resident who has lived in the area for 19 years, said: “The loss of light would make it like living in a cave.”

Allen Moses, a retired judge who lives in Clere Street, said: “One simply can’t understand why the developers feel there’s a need for all these offices. People are working at home now.

“The local restaurants and cafes don’t even open on Mondays and Fridays because people aren’t in London at that time. It’s just greed.”

The planning committee chose to postpone its decision on the future of the site, telling the developer it must complete a whole-life carbon assessment on the development.

The council is also concerned that the developer has put all of the affordable workspace in the basement where it will get little light – the developers say they are already working on a solution to this.

Finally, the council say it needs to carry out a proper assessment on the impact of the development on the residents of the supported housing block.

Cllr Martin Klute, chair of the committee, said that these issues “could affect the design of the scheme” and therefore, no decision could be made on the future of the development until adequate assessments were done.

Daniel Hall, asset director of Kanda Consulting, who are working with the developers, said: “This is a complex planning application and it is only right that Islington takes the time to ensure everything is in order.

“The sustainable building we have designed will last for 100 years and be three times as efficient as the current building – so waiting a couple of months to ensure we can all have confidence in the decision-making process is worth the wait.”