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A towering opportunity to regenerate this backwater
RICHARD Barrett is sitting in a Knightsbridge restaurant enthusing about Battersea and in particular the Nine Elms corridor, sweeping past New Covent Garden Market and down to the iconic power station. "It has evolved from a few things happening to becoming the biggest regeneration project in London,'" he says. "It is three times the size of Stratford and four times the size of Canary Wharf. "If you were a Martian flying over London and looking within the boundary of the GLA area you would look at Chelsea, Knightsbridge and the other expensive sites. And at Battersea - and you'd never guess which is the one that isn't developed. That Battersea is -undeveloped runs contrary to all the tenets of urban generation. It's less than two miles from Parliament and directly opposite Chelsea." Barrett has cause to make an argument for Battersea. Together with his business partner, Johnny Ronan, he owns Treasury Holdings, the company that wants to redevelop the power station. Treasury has come up with a £4.5 billion scheme to restore the Grade II* listed industrial landmark. He also knows about ambitious grand building projects. Established in Dublin in 1989 by school-friends Ronan and Barrett, Treasury has become the biggest commercial property builder in Ireland. They have swept everything before them as they have rebuilt large swathes of the Dublin docks and Irish capital. They have expanded overseas, to Russia and China, where Treasury has become the largest foreign developer in that vast country. Along the way, the duo, it almost goes without saying, have made themselves fabulously wealthy. Treasury now controls more than 120 individual real estate projects with a combined value in excess of €4.8 billion. The gross development value of all its schemes is €20 billion. Ronan and Barrett have also become feared throughout the property world. In Ireland, they are treated as business royalty - the bearded ex-accountant Ronan, who has a penchant for black (his clothes are usually black, as is his car), and the dapper former barrister Barrett. Part of their reputation is built on their aggression and fierce will to succeed, plus their refusal to talk to the press - Ronan never gives interviews, while Barrett also prefers to stay out of the public eye. Now they are set to be extremely well-known in London. This is a first for them in several ways. Despite their success, they have never taken on anything as high profile as Battersea. Neither have they been involved with a proposal that is so fraught with controversy. Indeed, it is perhaps a measure of the unfamiliar, delicately poised minefield they now find themselves negotiating that Barrett has agreed to break his habit and to talk to the press. In 2007, they bought the Battersea site for £400 million from developers the Hwang family. Six months ago, they unveiled their idea. At its heart was a 984ft glass tower designed by renowned Uruguayan architect Rafael Vinoly. The structure was shaped like a giant chimney or funnel - a tower with a giant skirt at its base. Air would be sucked in at the bottom and, as it heated up, rise through the building. This "ecodome" would enclose 2.5 million square feet of office space but, thanks to the natural air-conditioning, the energy bills would be cut by up to two-thirds. After a consultation exercise involving 15,000 people - "the largest ever seen in the UK for a project of this sort," says Barrett - and taking in the views of the heritage lobby, they have lopped 164ft off the original height, cut its diameter from 104ft to 82ft and moved it 100 yards away from the power station. The amount of office space has also been reduced - by half, down to 1.25 million square feet. The power station would be a retail and hotel complex. But under the revised plan, they have added a performance arena, ballroom, primary school and medical centre. Will it be enough? They've seen the Mayor, Boris Johnson, and his planning team, led by the deputy mayor, Sir Simon Milton. They are hopeful of winning approval but the outcome is far from definite. The problem is that their chimney, even in its trimmed state, is still visible from the bridges around Westminster and according to the London management policy drawn up by the previous mayor, Ken Livingstone, no building should be allowed to encroach upon the view west of the Houses of Parliament. While Barrett makes a passionate plea for the "green" credentials of the skyscraper, and while there is no doubting the breathtaking statement in Vinoly's vision, the rules are clear. Treasury has to hope that Johnson ignores them and gives the go-ahead. |
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