At September’s meeting of Full Council the Labour administration put forward for the ambitious regeneration of Harrow to build affordable homes, new schools, and redevelop our town centres, including in the ‘Heart of Harrow’ area from Wealdstone to Harrow on the Hill station.
Our robust proposals will also mean the Council will leave our costly and outdated Civic Centre and build a much smaller and more efficient office in the heart of Wealdstone and help regenerate this deprived area of Harrow.
The proposed new Civic Centre would be built on the site of the Peel House car park in Wealdstone. At just 2,500 square metres, the site is just a tenth of the size of the current Civic Centre and will lead to a savings in operational and maintenance costs of £528,000 a year.
At the site we’re leaving behind there are proposals for a new primary school, a new public square with shops, cafes, nightlife and maybe most importantly given the housing crisis in Harrow, 1145 new homes of which 458 will be affordable.
The most important part is that the price of these plans is nothing at all. We are absolutely determined that there will be zero cost for all this to the Council Tax payers of Harrow. Every penny will be funded by the money we earn by developing our land, from national and regional grants that we win, from inward investment and external funding.
Our plans will involve working cross-party to ensure that we’re using the expertise of all local Councillors to work in the interests of our residents. We have also set up a resident’s panel, so our communities are consulted on the regeneration programme from beginning to end.
In addition our school expansions programme has seen £125m invested into expanding our schools to keep up with demand, with work being done on 28 schools, including special needs schools, across the Borough – creating almost 6,000 primary places, over 2,000 secondary places and 151 special educational need places.
All of this work shows that we're building a better Harrow together, for today, and for future generations.
We are creating the places and the opportunities that our communities deserve: a thriving, modern and vibrant borough that makes Harrow a home to be proud of.
