Going over old ground - The Hound that is Grey

[Tim Lund]

Would there not be a danger that not pursuing Purelake would set a precedent? Large companies can happily sit for years in a kind of Mexican stand-off with local government - you might find it has been written into the business model.

They have their flats and that is all they wanted.

I think the precedent was set when God in His infinite wisdom allowed Sin to enter the world.

[Tim Lund]

Surely it makes a mockery of the whole system of having planning laws and applications if the developer just builds what they want anyway

...

it makes me angry! GRRRRRrrrrr!

It makes me angry too, but in the long run, it's better to channel that anger at

(1) reforming the whole system planning laws.

Obviously part of the problem is that developers want to maximise profits, and if one developer can get away with building cheaply, leaving residents and the general public to pay the price later, then it's going to be hard for others not to. But that's not going to change, and developers building the houses people want to live in is not a bad thing in itself. The problem is with the planning system. Why does it get things wrong?

Town & Country Re-engineering

(2) understanding the reduced capacity of government to enforce the planning restrictions

House prices Feb 2014

and

(3) thinking about the possibility of working with long term investors on how

flexible decisions could be taken to pencil in a café for the corner site, rather than let it go for a funeral parlour, pubs with declining economics could be easily converted to some other use. In fact, all that Lee and I could possibly want for Sydenham

Natural Planning

[leenewham]

We already have two pocket parks in Sydenham Road which are not very well used aside from a market part of the year, once a month (hopefully this will expand).

If we knock down the Greyhound Sydenham will greet people with a Sainsbury's and another large unit that isn't particularly attractive. There is on way to guarantee that this will be a decent place to eat with tables outside.

The best way to ensure we have a decent retail space in an attractive building is to make Purelake finish what they are obliged to do. All this impatience about the state of the building at the moment makes me angry too.

The Greyhound will be finished, eventually, but Purelake have been a nightmare and Lewisham Council have handled the whole situation very poorly.

I'd rather have the opportunity of a decent Pub in the Greyhound and be patient than have another dull public square (Purelake won't want to do anything, Lewisham's money has been spent, the pocket parks funding is too small to do anything spectacular, Purelake shouldn't be let of the hook and a good, visible, attractive pub would do wonders for the area).

Sigh…come on, have some patience and vision!

[JRobinson]

they could have sold cider

[Tim Lund]

Eden would have been a lot better with a pub.

Yes - had to wait another nine generations for alcohol

[michael]

Yes - had to wait another nine generations for alcohol

I think that when Noah got a bit tipsy he was not the first man to drink alcohol, and since Adam lived to see Noah's father born, it is quite possible that Adam and Eve liked the odd drink too.

[stuart]

Are those serpantine developers proposing to replace the Greyhound with an orchard?
Mine' s a Pink Lady ...

Stuart

[Tim Lund]

Are those serpantine developers proposing to replace the Greyhound with an orchard?
Mine' s a Pink Lady ...

Stuart

Would you Adam and Eve it?

[Robin Orton]

I think that when Noah got a bit tipsy he was not the first man to drink alcohol, and since Adam lived to see Noah's father born, it is quite possible that Adam and Eve liked the odd drink too.

Hm. What about Genesis 9.20-21: 'Noah, a man of the soil, was the first to plant a vineyard. He drank some of the wine and became drunk [...].'?

But I suppose it is possible that, as JRobinson suggests, cider was the preferred tipple of the earlier patriarchs:

'Blessed be the time that appil taken was
Therefore we maun singen, Deo gratias!'

[michael]

What about Genesis 9.20-21: 'Noah, a man of the soil, was the first to plant a vineyard. He drank some of the wine and became drunk [...].'?

I was going to bow to your superior knowledge of these things, but not before I checked what was actually written:

Vayachel Noach ish ha'adamah vayita karem
The (better) translation I have is: "Noah began to be a man of the soil, and he planted a vineyard."
No mention of it being the first planting of vines.

[Tim Lund]

What about Genesis 9.20-21: 'Noah, a man of the soil, was the first to plant a vineyard. He drank some of the wine and became drunk [...].'?

I was going to bow to your superior knowledge of these things, but not before I checked what was actually written:

Vayachel Noach ish ha'adamah vayita karem
The (better) translation I have is: "Noah began to be a man of the soil, and he planted a vineyard."
No mention of it being the first planting of vines.

[Nigel]

Whilst we are in a nostalgic mood , does anyone remember this post when it was a simple plea for a load of con-men to rebuild a pub they had knocked down ? Since then the intellectuals have moved in and it's all Samcerre, tart tatin and complex arguments about why the problem is not getting PureFlakes to rebuild but our inability to construct a cost benefit model to incentivise them . I guess we're are simply not clever enough .
Instead of talk of football now it's all Graeco-Roman pub quiz - honestly I sometimes wonder what i've been subsidising the FE sector for.
Anyway at risk of lowering the tone - and to save time - Rod, yes!, G-Man and Biscuit Man , yes! , Leenewham , yes! , Tim - I have no idea what you are trying to say .
A very good evening
Nigel

[Robin Orton]

Nigel is quite right to complain about the diversion of this thread on to irrelevant issues (for which Mr Lund was initially responsible), but I cannot resist responding to Michael's interesting posting.

I don't know Hebrew, so cannot challenge his translation of (I assume) the Masoretic text. I was quoting from the New Revised Standard Version, which is generally accepted (by Christian scholars, anyway) as the most scholarly and accurate. Another good modern translation is the New Jerusalem Bible, which gives a similar version to the NRSV: 'Noah, a tiller of the soil, was the first to plant the vine.'

On the other hand, the Authorised (King James) version has 'And Noah began to be a husbandman, and he planted a vineyard.' The Greek (Septuagint) version (which is of course older than the Masoretic text), has something similar, Kai erxato Noe anthropos georgos ges, kai ephyteusen ampelona - literally, 'And Noah began, a farmer (literally 'earth-working') man of the earth, and planted a vineyard.' These are both similar to Michael's version.

I don't know what the rationale of the NRSV and NJB translation is. I suppose one might speculate that it was thought that 'began' in fact (even if not grammatically, in the texts as we have them) must have originally gone with planting the vineyard rather than being a 'man of the soil' or husbandman. After all, we know from Genesis 4:2 that Cain had been 'a tiller of the ground', so Noah can hardly have been the first farmer.

[Tim Lund]

Anyway at risk of lowering the tone - and to save time - Rod, yes!, G-Man and Biscuit Man , yes! , Leenewham , yes! , Tim - I have no idea what you are trying to say .
A very good evening
Nigel

I think you do know what I'm trying to say, but I agree, it would be good if Biscuit Man could bring this back on topic. Think of such digressions as being how to conduct a serious discussion without loss of sense of humour, and getting into a flame war.

[michael]

Just to be clear, I didn't translate the Hebrew myself, I relied on a trusted translation.

But in fairness to the thread, I think it is disgraceful that Purelake have not done everything they can to rebuild the pub as in the planning application. I don't know how Lewisham can allow their logo to be display on their site as a partner. Any partnership between purelake and lewisham should cease until purelake fulfill their legal obligations on this site.

Purelake give property developers a bad reputation with this type of behaviour.

[perryman]

I was being a bit facetious. I don't know much about CPOs, but I understand they are not undertaken lightly, since they involve significant costs to the local council. In this case, I think the site with the requirement to rebuild the pub is, financially, a liability rather than an asset, so I I was thinking Purelake would love to be shot of it. The point it to ask whether there is anyone with the money required who thinks it could be, financially, an asset. To move forward from here, we need to have an estimate of what the costs of completing the work would be, and a realistic assessment of where they might come from. Setting lawyers on to chasing up Purelake for them after the event is not, IMHO, a realistic approach to funding anything.

Facetious or not, it is a good solution to the supposed deadlock.
CPOs are not to be taken lightly, but this is an exceptional circumstance.
A line needs to drawn under this now.

But it wont be. I feel the council are very much a big part of the problem. If they seriously demanded that their multimillion pound partners Purelake complete this work as contracted, then it would start tomorrow.
We need to keep the pressure on Lewisham council to make good their obligations to us in refurbishing the pub, as promised..

[simono]

Going over old ground indeed! Round and round in circles and no nearer an answer. All we have is not only not only an eyesore of a ruined pub but two unused and boarded up retail units.
I will repeat that I see no prospect of the Greyhound ever being completed so the site will never be occupied. And the pub building is now much to small anyway for commercial use and the building has deteriorated so far as to be unusable without huge amounts on money being spent. The developer will never do that and the Council have no way of forcing them to do so.
Better we knock it down and have at least one of the retail units as a good quality bistro with seats outside etc. And if Sainsbury's develop the Windmill they will pull out of this site and we can create a high quality outside space.
Lewisham lets get real and make the best of a very bad job and deliver something - anything - rather than something that ruins anything that is being done to regenerate the high street.

[harrym]

If you take a look at the really beautifully regenerated parts of London there are plenty of cafés offering outside coffees - with blankets provided for chilly days. Simply having an awning and outside seating creates a lovely light environment inside and out. Look at places like The Albion in Shoreditch (great cafe and deli). The weather at the moment is unusually bad I grant you but I think the idea that a dark cramped pub is the best Britain has to offer is outdated. Which isn't to say there aren't hundreds of utterly charming small historic pubs - but nobody could sensibly argue The Greyhound is that anymore.

Admin - is there any way to create a Pinterest board so we could share pics / design ideas? Would feel more positive / proactive than debating back and forth between two approaches which is what normally seems to happen on here. Especially as ultimately we all want the same thing - to see Sydenham thrive...

[leenewham]

Simono, why do you think the pub is too small?

Why do you think sainsburys won't take the unit behind the greyhound, despite having put in planning applications for the signage recently?

Do you have different information to us?

[blakewho]

Will people please stop perpetuating this rubbish that the Greyhound is too small to be a viable pub? As I've stated before it has a larger footprint than The Harp in Covent Garden which has been voted CAMRA national pub of the year on more than one occasion and for those who think that sort of thing is only for the centre of London I give you the burgeoning micropub movement as typified by the Door Hinge in Welling: http://whatpub.com/pubs/BEX/98/door-hinge-welling

There may well be many other valid arguments against the Greyhound ever reopening but its size is not one of them.