Government design tsar urges Gove to reject ‘deeply flawed’ plans to flatten Oxford Street M&S store

The government’s housing design tsar has called on Michael Gove to reject Pilbrow & Partners’ plans to demolish and rebuild a Marks & Spencer store on Oxford Street and said the row over the scheme goes “right to the heart” of discussions about sustainability.

Nicholas Boys Smith said the case for pulling down the 1930s building was “gossamer thin at best” and called the proposals to build a10-storey office and retail schemein its place “deeply flawed”.

The comments come a week after campaign group Save Britain’s Heritage said the controversy over the project, which has been criticised over embodied carbon concerns, was a matter of “international importance”.

Housing secretary Michael Gove ordered Westminster Council to halt the plansearlier this month, just days after they had been approved by London mayor Sadiq Khan.

Gove issued the local authority with an Article 31 holding direction to give the government time to decide whether or not to call in the scheme.

Khan had earlier announced he was sticking with his initial decision tolet the development proceed, having agreed to revisit the issue when it emerged the Greater London Authority had failed to consider a scathing report from its own climate adviser on the scheme’s carbon impact.

Boys Smith, who chairs the government’s Office for Place and is also the founder of think tank Create Streets, said yesterday the furore whipped up by the plans “is very much not a storm in a central London teacup”.

他说:“我们如何重用现有的20世纪早期和维多利亚时代晚期的百货商店、市政建筑和仓库，以鼓励更好、更宜居和更可持续的城镇中心，这是可持续发展、遗产、升级和地方建设讨论的核心。”

> Also read:Interview: Nicholas Boys Smith on design, deregulation and the Office for Place

他将暂停该计划的决定描述为“好消息”，并补充道:“我希望迈克尔•戈夫能够拒绝这一存在严重缺陷的提议。

“It creates no new homes, destroys an elegant and important interwar building, makes Oxford Street less lovable and pointlessly wastes oodles of embodied carbon in the process.

“The environmental case for pulling down this fine building is gossamer thin at best. We should be adapting the remaining building, not smashing it up.”

上周，“拯救英国遗产”组织敦促戈夫收回这些计划，并表示，拟议中的拆除是“一个关乎国家和国际的重要问题”。

The campaign group’s director Henrietta Billings said: “If we allow existing buildings to be demolished and replaced without properly prioritising comprehensive retrofit solutions, we will not meet our climate change commitments.”

She added: “The M&S building is a handsome landmark that has characterised Oxford Street for almost 100 years, helping shape one of London’s most famous and historic streets.

“We call on M&S to stick to their ambitious sustainability goals and re-think their plans.

“与综合改造方案相比，拆除和重建这座建筑的环境成本根本无法叠加。”

A report by Simon Sturgis, the GLA’s carbon advisor, claimed nearly 40,000 tonnes of CO2 would be emitted during construction, on top of the 53,000 tonnes of embodied carbon over the building’s 60-year lifespan.

A spokesperson for the Mayor of London said a “thorough assessment” of the scheme, including its carbon footprint, did not yield any grounds for intervention.

An M&S spokesperson said: “The plans we have submitted to build a new, vibrant M&S store fit for modern retail and sustainable office space has been approved at every stage and strongly supported by the local community as a key part of the regeneration of an iconic part of London.

“As well as attracting new investment and footfall, a detailed assessment on the carbon impact across the whole lifecycle of the building was undertaken by independent experts who concluded that the new build offered significant sustainability advantages over a refurbishment.”