The Land Valuation and Transfer

With the judicial review out of the way, the next step was for London and Continental Railways (LCR) and Argent to value the land so that it could be transferred for development to commence. The valuation process had three triggers:

1. Outline planning consent to be in place for the whole site.
2. LCR to have obtained vacant possession.
3. Detailed planning for phase one of the development to have been agreed.

With the first trigger in place, the next step was to achieve vacant possession and agree phase one of the development.

Achieving vacant possession

Delivering vacant possession² met unforeseen difficulties. By the end of the 19th century, King’s Cross was one of the largest railway depots in the world, and had been developed by different railway companies. Each company had legal rights to run trains along their respective lines through Acts of Parliament and easements. When the railways were nationalised and brought under a single authority in 1948, these rights transferred to the new authority, British Railways.³

While it was still an operational railway, these rights and wayleaves were unimportant and they lay dormant. However, when the land was transferred to LCR, vacant possession required that all previous rights be extinguished. This was not an academic exercise. While these rights existed, it was theoretically possible for someone to run a train through the site. Costly indemnities would have been required to cover potential outstanding liabilities, and these would have had significant implications for institutional borrowing. Over 50 different legal agreements, some dating back to the 1830s, had to be extinguished through a tortuous process of negotiation with Railtrack (successor body to British Railways). While Railtrack did not use these as a ransom to extract payment from the landowners, the process was slow and for Railtrack, at least, a low priority.

It is likely that the problem would have dragged on without the impetus of London’s successful bid for the 2012 Olympic Games in July 2005. King’s Cross was to be the main central London terminus for the games, and the concourse had to be finished before August 2012. In order for this to happen, government funding for the interchange had to be unfrozen and land ownerships had to be resolved. The proposed site for the new station concourse, that had been transferred to LCR in the original contract, now had to be transferred back to Network Rail. This enabled a new concourse to be built, with the design problems resolved through the construction of an elegant lightweight canopy designed by architect John McAslan + Partners (Figures 9.1 and 9.2).⁴

Figure 9.1: Section through King’s Cross concourse and underground.

As Figure 9.3 indicates, the area beneath Euston Road and King’s Cross station was a mass of underground lines. The works were technically difficult and expensive, and the overlap of landownerships, design approvals, liabilities, construction access, working areas and contracts had to be resolved quickly.

While previous works to the interchange had been loosely coordinated (see Chapter 3), there was now an urgent need to put more robust arrangements in place. The government appointed Michael Hurn from the Department for Communities and Local Government (DCLG) to act as the project sponsor for King’s Cross and Thameslink. The Department for Transport (DfT) had inherited three separate projects:

1. 

   Figure 9.2: Interior of the new King’s Cross concourse.
   

   The London Underground works, in itself three separate elements – the refurbishment and redesign of the ticket hall following the 1987 fire;⁵ the new Western Concourse – part of the Channel Tunnel Rail Link (CTRL) works; and the new Northern ticket hall to connect with the Midland Main Line services in St Pancras. The DfT was in effect client and funder for these works (Figure 9.4).

   

   Figure 9.3: King’s Cross – a tangle of underground lines.
   

2. Network Rail’s refurbishment of King’s Cross station, the construction of a new concourse to the west of the station and the demolition of the existing concourse to create a new public square.
3. The improvements to Thameslink and the construction of a new station beneath St Pancras.

As the land on which the new concourse was to be built had previously been transferred to LCR and Argent had already incorporated the Great Northern Hotel and taxi/bus interchange into its masterplan (and the Great Northern Hotel had been leased to a boutique hotel operator), all of these commitments had to be incorporated into the wider solution. In response, a tri-partite agreement was made between Network Rail, the DfT/London Underground Ltd (LUL) and LCR/

Figure 9.4: Underground and subway link designed by Allies and Morrison.

Argent. This set out arrangements for major land transactions on top of existing engineering contracts.

Transport consultants Mott Macdonald were brought in and a new programme was drawn up. LUL was paid performance incentives to complete works and clear its working areas by September 2008 so that work on the main concourse could start. By December 2009, the new platforms for the domestic rail services from Kent were complete. After much technical wrangling, the positioning of the escalators to connect the underground and main concourse was agreed and the plans started to fit together. Finally, listed building consents were signed-off for alterations to the Great Northern Hotel. As part of this, Network Rail cleared the wayleaves and other residual land encumbrances in order to provide LCR with vacant possession. Summing up this tortuous process, Michael Hurn, the DfT project sponsor, commented that, ‘the technical aspects were less important than the people. It was the individual relationships that eventually made it come together.’⁶

The First Phases of Development

While the parties had been busy securing the land transfers needed to start work, conditions in the London property market had changed dramatically. The failure of Northern Rock Building Society in September 2007 was a warning of problems on the horizon, but there was no real sense of what was to come. Argent, through its development partnership, King’s Cross Central Limited Partnership (KCCP), started to prepare contracts and raise money to begin development.⁸ Initially looking to borrow £600 million, it reduced the programme and scaled back preliminary borrowings to £400 million. From August 2008 the world was sliding towards a liquidity crisis as the property bubble, based on easy credit, burst. With the collapse of Lehman Brothers in September 2008, the financial slump intensified and banks began to get into difficulties. By October 2008, the credit crunch was in full swing, the entire banking industry was in crisis and lending came to a virtual halt. With the exception of the Olympic Games site, development in London and elsewhere all but stopped.

KCCP had been ready to sign major contracts, but its programme had been held back partly due to the judicial review. Had it not delayed the process by six months, KCCP would have committed to up-front expenditure prior to the worst property slump in living memory and may well have faced substantial financial difficulties. Ironically, the implacable opposition of the King’s Cross Rail Lands Group (KXRLG) may have saved the scheme.

First office buildings

As the market slowly began to stabilise, KCCP completed deals on two office developments in the southern part of the site (Figure 9.5). In 2010, a substantial plot was sold on a long lease to the real estate company BNP Paribas, and the money ploughed back into completing key infrastructure. Camden council then approached KCCP with a proposal to move its town hall and main corporate offices to the King’s Cross site. The building selected already incorporated the public swimming pool and gym, and being the closest building to Somers Town, it was a good location for the new town hall. From KCCP’s perspective it was probably the least valuable of the commercial buildings. As the market was only just picking up, the deal gave KCCP an additional cash injection when it most needed it. Camden council gained efficient new premises, and subsequently covered its costs by selling other properties on the back of a rising market.

Figure 9.5: First office buildings. From left to right, buildings by Allies and Morrison, David Chipperfield and Barton Willmore.

Financing the early stages of the scheme had been hand-to-mouth and involved a great deal of improvisation. During the height of the recession KCCP had committed over £150 million in up-front investment on infrastructure and site preparations. Much of this investment gave no immediate income. The first phases of the UAL, affordable housing and the renovation of the Great Northern Hotel had achieved enough income to keep the development going, and KCCP ploughed its returns back into the scheme. The first phases of the public realm, the Boulevard and Granary Square had been completed, and a place was emerging with distinctive character and growing activity. The development had survived, but it had been a close call requiring strong nerves. KCCP had not taken on significant debt, but neither had it received any return. In some ways the recession had worked in its favour. It had received HCA money and was well positioned to respond to a recovering office market that was suddenly facing a shortage of supply.

Variations to the Planning Consent

Since all the individuals who negotiated the planning consents on behalf of Camden council have since left the authority, a comprehensive archive has proved essential in maintaining continuity for the council. Since planning permission was granted in 2006, Camden council has agreed to a series of amendments to the consent, in the form of deeds of variation. Some of these were due to changes in the HCA funding regime for affordable housing, or changes in the market, while some were requested by Camden council. Responsibility for signing off reserved matters and details rests with Camden’s major developments team. Argent now funds approximately 2.5 planning posts in the team under a planning performance agreement.¹² The deeds of variation cover:

• Changes in the intermediate housing triggered by changes in HCA grant subsidy (significantly reduced from £120,000 per unit to £30,000). The restructuring was on better terms than the cascade agreement and allowed Camden council to have more one-bed units for the frail elderly, allowing them to free up larger, under-occupied public housing units elsewhere in the borough for re-letting to larger families.
• The provision of an additional tall building on the north of the site for student housing. This is outside the Greater London Authority (GLA)’s viewing corridors and was a change proposed by KCCP in response to early difficulties in getting the scheme underway. For Camden council, additional student housing was desirable as it met a clear demand and took pressure off the existing housing stock.
• The replacement of the pre-school provision with an extension of the primary school to allow the Frank Barnes School for the Deaf to relocate on the site. This was requested by Camden

  council. Twelve affordable units were lost as a result of this variation.

• The walk-in health clinic (but not the local health centre) was removed because the Primary Care Trust declined to take on the management of the facility.
• Minor reductions to building sizes have also been agreed. The cost savings to KCCP have been passed over in bonds and commuted sums to Camden council and have been put towards the provision of a larger sports hall on the site.
• The Construction Training Centre has been increased in size with additional funding provided by the KCCP.
• The size of the cycle storage has been reduced because TfL was unwilling to manage the facility. Cycle storage is now provided privately through a cycle shop.
• Residential car parking provision has been reduced, due to the lack of demand, particularly from occupants of the market housing.

Adoption of the Public Realm

By the end of 2015, KCCP had completed over 90 per cent of the public realm and open spaces, but Camden council has not exercised clauses under the section 106 agreement to adopt the main street and pedestrian network. It can still do so until the end of the development period, but its reluctance so far reflects both a desire to save money and KCCP’s high maintenance standards and inclusive approach to management. Adoption of the public realm will be an important test of Camden council’s resolve. During negotiations it was seen as a fundamental guarantee that the area would have a civic and inclusive character. The ambience of King’s Cross could be altered fundamentally by a change in ownership or management approach. Planning has few controls over this. Adoption might be a crude way of exercising long-term control, but it is effective.

Place-Making at King’s Cross Central

Attracting the right cafés, bars and shops

Argent understood that the King’s Cross brand needed to address all the elements that make up a place, down to the cafés, bars, public art and temporary events. Argent’s model was to enter into joint ventures with prospective tenants. One example is the lease arrangement with the restaurant Caravan, which occupies a prime location on Granary Square. Argent had visited its restaurant in nearby Exmouth Market, liked it, and persuaded the owners to open up in King’s Cross. Under the joint venture, Caravan pays a peppercorn rent for five years, KCCP pays towards the fit-out costs and in return receives a percentage of the turnover. Within three months of opening, a rent equivalent to that which was anticipated after five years of trading had been exceeded. This joint venture model allows independent firms to come to King’s Cross, and this contributes towards creating a more interesting place.

Figure 9.6: The Granary Building, now University of the Arts London, art installation and canalside steps.

Estate management events

Right from the beginning, Principles for a Human City had set out Argent’s objective that King’s Cross should be an accessible place with a vibrant mix of uses, a place that engaged and inspired.¹³ Active estate management was implicit in this and KCCP has worked hard to establish King’s Cross as an attractive location.

The place-making programme is now managed by a dedicated internal team,¹⁴ but originally evolved through a process of trial and error. Understanding how the area works and why has been crucial to its success. The programme is loosely divided into three strands – arts, events and community. All aim to develop links with surrounding communities and broaden involvement in the site.

Arts

Prior to the start of development, the German Gymnasium was the initial venue for the arts programme and hosted a range of photography and other exhibitions. KCCP soon recognised that it needed more professional input to the programme and set up an Arts Advisory Panel and employed a specialist curator. In 2009, an artist-in-residence programme was established in partnership with the Arts Council. The curators¹⁵ commissioned a series of temporary artworks, including an over-sized illuminated birdcage with a swing,¹⁶ and an installation of geometric aluminium foil across the Victorian buildings (Figure 9.6).¹⁷ A recent project, completed in summer 2015, is an art installation in the form of a 40-metre-long natural bathing pond (Figure 9.7).¹⁸

Events

The opening of Granary Square with its choreographed fountains (Figure 9.8) has proved to be a major attraction, particularly for local families and attracted 175,000 visitors in 2012 and 2013. It has provided a new venue for events, such as live Wimbledon tennis screenings, a floating cinema, yard sales, sports days, music and poetry performances, battle re-enactments, steam events, festivals and events (Figure 9.9). There is also a regular programme of baseline events and a range of stalls selling street food. Most events are free, but receipts from any commercial events are ploughed back into the events fund.

Figure 9.7: Natural bathing pool.

Community

KCCP has devoted considerable resources to maintaining the conversation with the local communities through an extensive programme of tours for local schools and groups. The visitor centre, set up and funded by KCCP, conducts two formal guided tours a week, and in 2014 it received 11,000 visitors from across the world.

The programme has also included temporary activities and pop-ups such as the Filling Station, a bar and café in an old petrol station on Goodsway (Figure 9.10) and the Skip Garden, a series of portable allotments in construction skips.¹⁹ This was one of the first temporary projects on site and is run by Global Generation, a charity that involves young people.²⁰ As different areas of the King’s Cross scheme are developed, the skips are moved to new locations.²¹ In 2015, it moved to a new site next to the outdoor swimming pond, and was rebuilt in partnership with students from the Bartlett School of Architecture (Figure 9.11).

As the development grows, it is increasingly difficult to separate KCCP’s place-making programme from its property management role. Some of the property management costs are recovered from the tenants’ service charge and tenants are involved through an events forum. This work was initially funded through the section 106 package (£1.75 million for public art), but is now funded directly by KCCP. The use of site hoardings for art and site interpretation (Figures 9.12 and 9.13), and the production of numerous publications and leaflets have all helped to create a buzz, attracting potential new investors and occupants. The £1 million social fund has yet to be allocated pending agreement by Camden and Islington councils of its spending criteria.

Figure 9.8 (above): Granary Square fountains.

Figure 9.9 (top): An event at Granary Square.

At the time of writing (February 2016), approximately 50 per cent of the development was complete, but a new community was emerging with a mixture of different housing types, a primary school and new areas of public space (Figures 9.14 and 9.15).

Employment and Training²²

King’s Cross Recruit (KXR), a skills and recruitment centre, was funded by Argent through the section 106 agreement and opened in January 2014. Essentially KXR acts as a placement or referral agency between those wanting a job at King’s Cross and those offering such jobs. It handles vacancies in any sector, though in practice these are largely in the retail and hospitality sectors. Jobs in construction are handled by the Construction Skills Centre, with training delivered by Carillion. The centre offers training, apprenticeships, employment advice and job opportunities to local people looking to work in construction. To date, over 450 people have gained a qualification through its work.

The remit of KXR is explicitly employer-focused; it aims to find the best candidate for the job. Ideally, these will be from local communities in Islington and Camden, but also further afield where necessary. Local employers provide details of vacancies which are posted on the KXR website and social media. KXR then works with local authorities, schools, colleges, skills and training agencies, social enterprises, charities and others to encourage referrals of suitable candidates. It interviews, screens and filters these before passing a shortlist on to employers.

KXR has placed over 380 people in local jobs since the beginning of 2014, and 80 per cent of these have come from either Camden or Islington. However, the task is less straightforward than originally envisaged when the section 106 agreement was outlined. The programme was designed to level the playing field and tackle high levels of disadvantage and unemployment by ensuring that local residents have better access to local jobs. However, many of the harder-to-place unemployed have been out of work for a long time; some have disabilities, many are young people who left school disillusioned, some with few qualifications. Many also have little concept of the working environment, of the expectations of employers or the basic communication skills required to deal with customers. KXR has formed clear views on the kind of training needed, but at present has no remit or budget to provide training itself. Instead it must rely on local training providers, but finds that the training on offer is sometimes inappropriate or of poor quality. KXR can only help those who are work-ready.

North Central One

The new piece of London emerging at King’s Cross now has its own postcode: NC1. When completed in 2020, the scheme will comprise 23 office buildings (316,000 square metres), 46,400 square metres of retail and leisure space, and close to 2,000 homes. An estimated 45,000 people a day will work in or visit King’s Cross overall. One-quarter of the scheme is dedicated to art, culture and leisure uses and more than 20 historic buildings will have been refurbished. Within the scheme will be 10.5 hectares of parks and other public space, including ten new public squares and 20 new streets. In the centre of the scheme is the new University of the Arts London with 4,000 students and staff. Argent did not set out to attract any particular sector or tenant, but wanted the mix to reflect London in all of its diversity. In some respects, by attracting the creative sector to the area, Argent has been able to broaden the site’s appeal beyond the financial services sector (from which demand is now limited). In January 2013 Google announced that King’s Cross would be its headquarters for several thousand staff and has bought a long lease for a 93,000 square metre building to the east of King’s Boulevard.

There will be 13 different residential developments in a mix of tenures on the scheme, including a 27-storey tower for 650 students.²³ Most of the homes on site will be single family units (1,309), and over one-fifth have been developed and already sold. Predicted values for the first residential units were around £700 per square foot. Today, the blended average is around £1,400 per square foot and is still increasing.²⁴ One Housing Group is the partner

Figure 9.10: The Filling Station, temporary bar and café in a disused petrol station.

Figure 9.11: Skip Garden and temporary pavilions designed by students from the Bartlett School of Architecture.

Figure 9.12: Hoarding as art.

Figure 9.13: Hoarding as viewpoints.

for the first phase of affordable housing – 250 affordable homes for rent in three separate buildings.

The New King’s Cross Station Square

Once the decision had been taken to fund the new concourse for King’s Cross station, the opportunity arose to remove the existing temporary concourse and create a new public space.²⁵ Initially Network Rail was inclined to retain it for the retail income, but this was rejected by Camden council. Network Rail proposed extending the contract for the concourse and commissioning John McAslan + Partners for the redesign. Camden council held McAslan in high regard, but argued for an open competition for what was, after all, the largest new public space to be carved out of the fabric of London since Trafalgar Square. Camden council wanted to canvas new ideas as widely as possible and Network Rail agreed to a competition through the Royal Institute of British Architects (RIBA).

The site presented considerable challenges. The underground concourse had been built with no consideration for any public space above it. It was like designing landscape on the lid of a tin. Moreover, the position of stairways, entrances, vent shafts and emergency escape points were all predetermined. Sandwiched between a mainline station and Euston Road, it was hardly going to be a ‘piazza’. It has three main functions. First, it is a place of transit, between different modes of transport. Second, it is an external waiting room for the station. Finally, it provides a setting for the grand south façade of King’s Cross station.

Figure 9.14: (above): Mixed tenure housing and primary school.

Figure 9.15 (top): Gasometer Park.

The competition was won by Stanton Williams - architects for the Granary Building refurbishment. The scheme started immediately after the 2012 London Olympic Games and was completed in early 2014. By and large, it has successfully dealt with the complexities of the brief and has revealed the grandeur of the front of King’s Cross. It is a far busier space than envisaged, and provides a popular external space, with a kiosks and temporary stalls selling food. The detailing is simple and the operational structures that intrude into the space have been elegantly incorporated into the design (Figure 9.16). The only disappointments are the intrusive ring of security bollards, the inconsistency of the paving between the Euston Road and the concourse, and the poor detailing of the canopy over the station exit. These elements, all outside the architect’s remit, should have been resolved by Camden council and Network Rail.

Impact on the Surrounding Areas

One of Camden council’s original objectives was that the King’s Cross development should bring about regeneration of the wider area. While it is difficult to separate the impact of the development from that of the CTRL and the refurbishment of St Pancras, new investment is apparent.²⁶ The King’s Place scheme by Parabola Land Ltd was the first development on a site close to King’s Cross.²⁷ Housing development is taking place along the canal at Jubilee Wharf (the Shaw Corporation), and the Health Authority is now considering the options for the redevelopment of the nearby St Pancras Hospital. To the rear of the British Library, the Crick Institute (a major cancer research centre developed under a partnership between University College Hospital, University College London and the Wellcome Trust), is nearing completion. Planning applications have been submitted for two commercial blocks immediately opposite King’s Cross station. Finally, Camden council’s old offices, next to the Town Hall, have been sold for redevelopment as a boutique hotel.

Figure 9.16: King’s Cross station square.

Camden council has once again become a housing developer, and is carrying out estate restructuring in the immediate area, retaining the social housing but building additional private and mixed tenure units to cross-subsidise the development. The Maiden Lane Estate, to the north of King’s Cross, and parts of Somers Town are being transformed. To the east, in Islington, investment in the Bemerton estate has improved the immediate area without radically changing

its social composition. The southern end of Caledonian Road in Islington is, however, gentrifying rapidly and this is likely to continue. In the absence of dedicated and detailed research, it is not possible to assess the impact of the development on displacement and gentrification or on the social composition of the wider area. The authors hope to assess this in due course.

Conclusions

The achievement of a planning consent was just the start of the process for Argent. The complexities of coordinating the interchange, removing easements and dealing with other statutory bodies have only been touched upon in this chapter and could be areas of study in their own right. On top of all of this, the development still had to be built.

The scheme had been designed to be sufficiently robust to cope with at least two business cycles, with the flexibility to adapt to changing technological requirements and market conditions. It passed both tests, but by the skin of its teeth. The flexibility afforded by the hybrid planning permission allowed works to be re-phased to deal with very difficult market conditions. Elements such as the university and the affordable and student housing made the scheme more robust by picking up alternative funding streams. The scheme is likely to be extremely profitable in the longer run, but at the beginning was right on the margin. This underlines the virtual impossibility of judging the right amount of affordable housing or the size of the section 106 benefits package in such a scheme. KCCP’s use of hoardings, art installations, events and temporary uses has animated King’s Cross and created an identifiable location during a period when it is still a substantial building site.

Today, Camden council planners are generally very positive about the thoroughness of the planning process, the documentation and the development. The balance of certainty versus flexibility has worked. There have been teething difficulties, including the definition of what constitutes a unit of student housing and the over-provision of car parking, but these are probably inevitable given the complexity of the scheme. So, too, are the relatively minor changes to the scheme. The flexibility built into the consents and into aspects of the section 106 agreement has allowed it to be built, and there is no evidence that the KCCP has abused this latitude.²⁸ The scheme always depended on openness and trust, and this has been maintained by both sides.