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The Court of Appeal has dismissed an application to appeal against the refusal of permission for a judicial review challenge against planning permission for a new tall building on the corner of Museum Street and New Oxford Street. Selkirk House is a proposed new office building and mixed use scheme that will replace an existing NCP car park and former Travelodge Hotel.
A judicial review challenge was brought by a local resident and campaign group arguing that the decision of Camden Council was flawed for an alleged failure to consider alternatives to the height of the proposed tower and failure to have regard to an allocation of part of the site in the development plan. Both grounds of challenge were dismissed by Lang J at an oral renewal hearing in September 2024.
The Court accepted the developer’s submissions that alternatives had been considered during an extensive pre-application engagement with the Council and statutory consultees and that was sufficient to satisfy the requirements of the local plan policy. There had already been a reduction in height and no further reduction was possible or viable. Whilst the relevant part of the allocation policy, relating to heritage protection, had not been specifically considered, that did not add anything material to other similar local plan policies which had been considered and applied.
The unsuccessful Claimant appealed to the Court of Appeal against the refusal of permission and that application was finally dismissed on the papers at the end of November.
Jenny Wigley KC represented the developer and Interested Party in the litigation.
The decision of the High Court (that was upheld by the Court of Appeal) is here.
