Hundreds more ‘affordable’ homes could be coming to the heart of the capital’s academic and research district after a North London council unveiled its latest proposals for a £500m regeneration scheme.
Camden Council has touted the delivery of 401 new energy-efficient flats – at least half of which would be affordable – and 300,000 square feet of commercial space from redeveloping Brownfield land at Camley Street and Cedar Way Estate in King’s Cross.
Sat within the city’s ‘Knowledge Quarter’ which includes arts and life science institutions such as University College London (UCL), The Francis Crick Institute, The British Library and the Alan Turing Institute, the Labour-run council says the project is poised to bring over 1,000 jobs in the light industrial, tech, creative and life science sectors.
The council said half of the new homes will be either at social rent for those families on the borough’s housing waiting list, or at intermediate rent for key workers. Camden’s Cabinet Member for New Homes and Community Investment, Cllr Nasrine Djemai, said the mix of “affordable” one to four-bedroom properties were desperately needed by locals.
Proposals to build on the site have been in the pipeline for more than a decade – and not without argument. In 2024, a homeless man lost his legal battle against the council after they evicted him from under a walkway near railway tracks on the site. Mr Leo Fieran said he had been living there continuously since 2007. In years prior, the council also faced pressure from local businesses who were nervous about the regeneration leading to gentrification.
Having begun its search for developer partners in 2023, a year ago the council chose the firms Ballymore and Lateral for the joint venture. The local authority has secured £1.5m from the Government’s Brownfield Land Release Fund (BLRF) to fund the scheme.
The proposals are set to go before council’s Planning Committee in early 2026 and if approved construction will begin that year, the council said. The project is expected to be finished by 2030.
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