A huge new South London skyscraper district will get even bigger despite residents’ fears developers are trying to recreate Canary Wharf without the Underground station. 

Lewisham councillors waved through plans for 405 extra homes and 382 student rooms on a redevelopment site in Deptford at a planning meeting on June 12.

The decision means the total number of new homes and student rooms on the 4.54 hectares Deptford Landings site – larger than eight football pitches – will increase from 1,132 to 1,919.

The student flats will be accommodated in a new purpose built 22-storey tower and over half the extra homes will be built in a 29-storey tower.

Both will be located in a part of the site known as ‘plot 5’. 

The tallest building on the Deptford Landings site will now reach 35-storeys after councillors gave the green light to separate but linked plans to add 11 storeys to a previously approved tower block on a section of the site known as plot 1. 

Two residents living in recently completed flats in Deptford Landings spoke against the proposals to increase the number of homes and size of buildings on the site at the meeting. 

One woman, who didn’t give her name, branded the plans for more homes “unrealistic.”

She said: “We’re trying to make Canary Wharf from Deptford when we don’t have any Tube station. […] Lewisham [council]  may come into real problems when people wouldn’t be able to travel or get medical help.

“In terms of buses… I can tell you 47, 188, 189 they [are] already filled. Let’s talk about GPs. It’s very hard to book [an] appointment with [a] GP.” 

Speaking on the plans to increase the height of the skyscraper on plot 1, her neighbour Cath Squelch added: “You are building a site which is bigger than the village I grew up in and there seems to be no facilities or allocation for more doctors, dentists, nurseries, especially when it is being advertised as being family friendly and there’s a large number of small children living in the existing site.”

Council planning officer Geoff Whitington said officials were in the process of negotiating a Community Infrastructure Levy [CIL] payment of around £4 million to support facilities in the area, in addition to a separate payment for transport. 

David Robinson, the council’s major and strategic projects manager, added that £10 million in CIL had been secured for the wider Deptford Landings site, which would be used to build new infrastructure to support the additional residents. 

Plans to build 1,132 homes on the Deptford Landings site in towers up to 24 storeys tall were approved in principle in 2016.

The site is split into six plots, across which the 1,132 homes were originally meant to be located. 

One of the planning applications approved by Lewisham councillors on June 12 removed plot 5 from the 1,132 homes masterplan.

Homes previously meant to be built on plot 5 to meet the 1,132 target will now be constructed across plot 1 and plot 3 by increasing the height of some of the buildings.

The application to add 122 homes across plot 1 and plot 3 by approving taller buildings, including the 35 storey skyscraper, was passed by a Lewisham Council planning committee with one abstention from Councillor Liam Curran.

Cllr Curran, Labour member for Sydenham, said he was concerned the issue of sunlight loss to properties neighbouring the development hadn’t been adequately settled. 

The second application to build 405 flats and 382 student rooms on plot 5 and to remove it from the 1,132 homes masterplan for the site was passed unanimously by the planning committee.

Simon Slatford from Lichfields, developer Lendlease’s agent, said he was “proud” of the plans brought forward to the committee.

Addressing councillors, he said: “The Deptford Landings site is allocated in your emerging local plan with an indicative capacity of 1,940 homes compared to the 1,132 that’s currently permitted.

"Lendlease is proud of what has been achieved to date and are keen to build out high quality homes and employment space.”