Basement conversion in Bush Hill Park

Start with the basement conversion brief

Distinguish an existing cellar conversion from excavation for a new basement. Record levels, drainage, access and the adjoining structures, and obtain project-specific ground and structural investigations before relying on a design or budget.

Plan temporary works, waterproofing, ventilation, escape and spoil removal as part of the same brief. Ask Hampstead Chartered Surveyors to assess party-wall matters and Hampstead Architecture & Planning to coordinate the design requirements. An area name alone does not establish ground conditions.

The local building context

Enfield’s character appraisal places Bush Hill Park about 0.75km south-east of Enfield town centre, immediately west of the branch line from Edmonton Green to Enfield Town. In 1875 the North London Estates Company bought the 373 acres now known as Bush Hill Park; the building of the station in 1880 gave an impetus to development, and most of the earliest houses were designed for the company by R. Tayler Smith. As originally conceived, the estate straddled the railway, with artisan housing to the east, and the conservation area covers only part of the surviving core of its prestige development.

The appraisal divides the conservation area into three character areas: the core, which includes Wellington Road, Queen Anne’s Gardens, Queen Anne’s Place, Dryden Road and Abbey Road; the gated Private Road; and the area around the station. First-phase houses are large and detached, influenced by Arts and Crafts, in brown stock brick with red dressings, with high pitched tiled roofs, tall chimneys and timber sashes. Second-phase houses are generally smaller and mostly semi-detached, with red-brick ground floors, rendered upper floors, casements and bays; the later ones, particularly in Abbey Road, often have mock-Tudor details.

Between 1914 and 1960 the remaining plots were filled with modest semi-detached houses and bungalows. After 1960 most of the larger houses in Village Road, at the south end of Wellington Road and on the north side of Private Road were replaced by blocks of flats, until designation in 1987 halted such redevelopment. The appraisal counts about 273 houses, most still in single occupancy, and 22 blocks of modern flats. Around the station, buildings stand at the back of the pavement without front gardens, with three-storey terraces with attics along Queen Anne’s Place.

• Enfield: Bush Hill Park Conservation Area Character Appraisal, approved February 2015 (PDF)

Local design and consent context

Planning Data records the Bush Hill Park Conservation Area, reference CA16, as a London Borough of Enfield conservation area, and the appraisal says it was designated in 1987 and extended to include Private Road in 1994. Enfield, which has 22 conservation areas, links four documents for it: the character appraisal, the management proposals, the 2006 Article 4 Directions, one document for parts of eleven conservation areas, and an Article 4 map.

The character appraisal was first adopted in 2006, reviewed and updated in February and March 2013 and approved in February 2015. The management proposals, also approved in February 2015, confirmed the boundaries following a review in May 2013 and intended five-yearly reviews, but Enfield’s page links no later document for Bush Hill Park. The proposals were to be incorporated in an Enfield Design Guide Supplementary Planning Document in due course; Enfield’s list of adopted supplementary planning documents includes no design guide.

The appraisal regards the street greenery as the area’s key characteristic and finds the large plots in relation to house size a particularly strong feature. It records new development as mainly side, rear and garage extensions, generally of a reasonably high standard, says the Article 4 Direction appears to have been effective, and makes reinstating lost features, as the opportunity arises over the medium term, the principal conservation objective.

• Planning Data: Bush Hill Park Conservation Area (CA16), London Borough of Enfield
• Enfield: Bush Hill Park Conservation Area Character Appraisal, approved February 2015 (PDF)
• Enfield: conservation areas
• Enfield: Bush Hill Park conservation area
• Enfield: Bush Hill Park Conservation Area Management Proposals, approved February 2015 (PDF)
• Enfield: adopted supplementary planning documents

Access and site planning

Enfield says noisy building work that can be heard at the site boundary should only take place Monday to Friday, 8am to 6pm, and Saturday, 8am to 1pm, and is not allowed outside these times or on bank holidays unless agreed with the council in advance. In a block of flats, check the lease and any rules the building manager sets on noise and deliveries. If you will live at home through the work, decide which rooms stay usable and when water or power will be off, and tell neighbours what is planned and when.

• Enfield: noise nuisance and noisy building work hours
• LEASE: alterations and home improvements

Continue planning

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