West Hampstead Interchange

The West Hampstead Interchange area is identified in the Fortune Green and West Hampstead Neighbourhood Plan and the Camden Local Plan as a growth area. The area is largely shaped by the railway lines that cross it and contains a mixture of uses, including town centre, commercial and residential uses. The area includes part of the designated Finchley Road / Swiss Cottage town centre as well as part of West Hampstead town centre.

The Growth Area was originally identified due to the potential for a comprehensive combined interchange development between the three West Hampstead stations (London Underground, London Overground and Thameslink). Whilst this never progressed, the Thameslink and Overground stations have received significant investment and have been upgraded. However the need to improve the interchange environment for passengers between the stations and for the wider area remains a key issue to address, together with achieving step free access to the underground stations.

Redevelopment within the growth area as a whole provides an opportunity to enhance the area and address key issues of poor movement and integration with surrounding communities, as well as providing community uses and improved open spaces, making more efficient and better designed use of Camden's limited land.

There are 5 individual sites allocated in this area they are:

The February 2020 draft of the Plan states that the West Hampstead Interchange area has the potential to strengthen its role as a mixed-use area and deliver a significant increase in the number of permanent self-contained homes, employment, town centre uses including retail, health / community facilities and open space. Key points from the West Hampstead Interchange area policy aim to ensure that new developments within the area:

When adopted, the area policy would form part of the Council's Development Plan and be used by developers to work up proposals for allocated and unallocated sites in the area. It (along with other emerging policies in the Plan) provides an opportunity to proactively plan for the change we want to see happen in an area rather reacting to specific development proposals one site at a time. We know that proposals for specific sites can change and evolve even after a site has planning permission which is why we need to ensure that there is a firm policy in place to help shape any new proposals that may come forward including those for sites which already have planning permission.

In total 66 stakeholders responded to this section of the Site Allocations Local Plan which includes the area policy and individual site policies and 560 people visited our the 2020 commonplace for the West Hampstead Interchange area. A selection of the comments we received are set out below for information. It is intended that a summary document setting out all of the comments received and officer responses to them (including ones that are sent in during this consultation period) will be published when we consult on the next draft of the Plan (Publication Draft).