Client: Kings College, London Campus
Gerald Eve LLP were appointed to advise Kings College London (KCL) in 2008 on a review of their property assets comprising their entire central London portfolio of five education campuses, various student accommodation sites and sports grounds. We inspected each property and undertook a planning and development assessment to provide Existing Use and Market Values for each of the assets.
Our review incorporated over 120 individual properties, many of which we subject to listing. Most notably KCL owns the Medical School building at the St Thomas’ Hospital site, almost directly opposite the houses of Parliament – a world heritage site and adjacent to the Grade
I listed Lambeth Palace. Strategic views, setting and height and massing for any emerging scheme proposals each had to be considered in the context of delivering a viable scheme proposal.
In this particular case our review promoted a strategy based upon a “portfolio approach” working between various London Boroughs, including the over-arching role of the Greater London Assembly (GLA), to facilitate the release of the Medical School Building for a flagship
development in tandem with the wider rationalisation of parts of KCL’s portfolio. This principle involved considering various “use class swaps” between sites and reconfiguring accommodation types between locations to meet the strategic needs of the College to provide the right accommodation in the right locations – but having specific regard to relative values of each to maximise the benefits available.
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