ALT 10,000+ objections, thousands of conversations on the streets, and 2 cancelled hearings later - Hondo Tower has fallen! Yesterday, Taylor McWilliams withdrew his application from the GLA’s Planning Unit for the second and final time, closing the chapter on a vanity project that was never should have been greenlit in the first place. A 20 storey mega-tower consisting only of offices with no benefit to local communities in the area, this development was an affront to put up in a borough where average wait for social housing is +10 years.

ALT #FightTheTower was born 3 years ago out of determination to fight back against one man’s monopolisation of our neighbourhood. We decided to take on this project not because we hated change, or because we really loved low rise neighbourhoods. We took a stand against our council’s elected representatives putting one man’s profit over the wellbeing, health, and livelihoods of residents in the name of ‘development’. We wanted to protect the livelihoods of local businesses, and fight for the thousands of residents whose objections had been ignored in favour of one developer and his well-paid advisors and supporters. And we won. We are very happy and proud of our collective effort to push back, and happy that this infernal tower has been buried for good.

ALT But the real fight is now truly beginning. We need to have real conversations about what development means in this city. We cannot keep seeing councils tick boxes and call that consultations, we cannot keep seeing ‘development’ come at the expense of the small businesses and the people paying most of the taxes in our communities and providing most of the affordable alternatives. Something's got to give. Today (and let’s be real - for the rest of this week) we celebrate, but tomorrow we organise to take our neighbourhoods and cities back. In solidarity, Save Nour Save Brixton