Since its inception the Society has aimed to preserve and enhance Blackheath. In the early days our work mainly took the form of resisting major threats, such as motorways, as described in our book “Guardians of The Heath”.
Under the current legislative framework for planning and development we participate constructively with local councils (and often with other local amenity societies) in drafting new local policies and also in scrutinising hundreds of applications each year for new buildings and modifications to existing ones. In recent years we have extended our activity to include the important issue of trees. There are limited legal protections for these but we do encourage owners to trim and retain rather than fell, wherever possible. We seek to follow proposals that affect the Village and our local Conservation Areas in both Lewisham and Greenwich – the boundary runs right through the Village. We also take a very active interest in major applications for areas peripheral to Blackheath, such as Lewisham town centre, Lee Green and Kidbrooke, which could affect Blackheath and its residents indirectly.
We do all this with a Planning Group of Society volunteers, who review, discuss and comment on the new issues, policies and applications we see as most significant. This group includes enthusiastic amateurs and qualified professionals. You can see our Planning Principles here .
We are very keen to hear from members who would like to join our effort. The only qualification is to care about Blackheath.
Blackheath is covered by Lewisham and Greenwich boroughs. We focus on an area of up to a mile from the centre of the Village, occasionally further for very big developments. You can access current and past planning applications for Lewisham here and for Greenwich here.
We have had great success over the years resisting unacceptable threats to Blackheath, while improving the details of other plans. A new element of our work is to promote and scrutinise guidelines for adapting to climate change: the retrofitting of buildings to make them more energy efficient, the reduction in emissions from homes and motor vehicles, and the maintenance of our local tree cover for its many environmental benefits.
We share the highlights of our work in our Society newsletters. We keep members informed, in our weekly emails to members, of any current applications or consultations of note. And we seek to ensure that nearby members potentially affected by new applications are made aware of these.
We provide an annual summary of our work. You can find the latest version here .
