MIPIM UK 2015: Attempts to capture the uplift in property values created by Crossrail have failed, said Greater London Authority chief of staff and deputy mayor Sir Edward Lister, responding to a question from the audience at today’s Investors into Cities – Downing Street Forum conference session.
Lister said that forthcoming infrastructure investment including HS2 and Crossrail 2 means finding an “eyewatering” £28bn.
“The challenge is, as we develop new models, how to capture value. We need a more sophisticated community infrastructure levy-type mechanism,” Lister said. He added that the value increases are known to be 10% to 20% but the effort to capture this was “a crude attempt”.
During the session Lister had outlined how London was facing up to the challenge of being the fastest growing city in Europe and having returned to its pre-Abercrombie, 1939 population level of 8.6m. Improved infrastructure is one aspect of this, but he said that the housing market will never be cooled unless building is increased. “We have got to move away from the model of home ownership as the prevailing type of tenure,” he added.
“Land is not the challenge,” he said. “The issue is the capacity and cash to develop. We need to double the rate of construction to meet demand and we have got to meet it or the city will start to decline.”
Click here for all the news, views and analysis from MIPIM UK
.
