Estates Gazette: 'Laughing Stock' Lewisham Gateway back on track

This week's Estates Gazette reports that thanks to an anticipated grant from the Homes and Communities Agency's Get Britain Building fund, the long-dormant Lewisham Gateway scheme (a mixed-use commercial and residential proposal for the heart of Lewisham, which EG says had become an industry laughing stock) is back on track.

To get the controversial scheme off the ground, EG reckons that the developers Taylor Wimpey and Mace will jettison the cinema and scale back the retail space by about 40%. If all goes as expected, it would mean the first of the homes being ready by 2014.

Property company Land Securities is considering redeveloping Lewisham Shopping Centre and a cinema could form part of that scheme instead - as LandSecs notes in the article, this is the only London borough without a multiplex.

The article wraps up by suggesting the horrific possibility that Lewisham could be "the new Wandsworth".