The number of new skyscrapers being built in London has reached record levels as increasingly tall buildings spread to the city’s suburbs.
London has 510 towers in the pipeline and a record number of 115 schemes are under construction, a report released today revealed.
That compares with just compared to the 455 which were in the offing and 91 buildings being built at the same time last year.
More than 120 tall buildings – classified as those over 20 stories – have been built in the last four years, the report by the thinktank New London Architecture revealed today.
An artist’s impression of the cluster of new skyscrapers being built in the City of London shows how quickly the capital’s skyline is changing. Among the buildings going up in the City is the huge ‘1 Undershaft’ tower and the so-called ‘Can of ham’
Another image from today’s report shows the huge number of tall residential buildings going up around the O2 arena
An artist’s impression shows how the so-called ‘Cheesegrater’ and ‘Gherkin’ buildings are set to be swamped by other towers
One of the most distinctive of the new buildings is the 24-storey ‘Can of ham’ office block, real name 60-70 St Mary Axe
The report shows tall buildings are no longer confined to the City and Docklands business districts, with a third of those being planned now on the outskirts of the city, tube zones three, four and five.
This could be due to the increasing demand for housing forcing people to look for flats in high-rises rather than houses.
Around 90 per cent of the skyscrapers planned are residential, rather than offices, and could provide more than 100,000 new homes, the report states.
New London Architecture said in a statement: ‘Political and economic uncertainty, mainly due to Brexit, appears to have had a small impact.
‘The rate of applications is down 10% from 2016 and 35% from 2015, although this was a bumper year due to the application of Greenwich Peninsula for over 40 tall buildings. If you take this away the number has been relatively consistent since 2013.’
Among the buildings planned for the City are the so-called ‘Scalpel’ building (left) and the bleak-looking 130 Fenchurch Street
London’s Dockland’s area, home of the Canary Wharf tower, is also set to host a rash of new office and residential blocks
Among the blocks going up is the 67-storey ‘Flower Tower’ residential block in Tower Hamlets (left) and the mixed-use ‘One Blackfriars’ on the south bank of the Thames (right)
The world’s tallest modular tower is planned for Croydon, in the south of the capital, and suburban areas Bromley and Waltham Forest have tall buildings in the pipeline for the first time
Peter Murray, Chairman of New London Architecture said: ‘We continue to see a steady increase in the number of tall buildings coming forward and with London’s population continuing to increase and the demand for new homes only getting higher, our view remains that that well designed tall buildings, in the right place, are part of the solution.
‘Uncertainties and challenges to deliver these tall buildings remain, which is perhaps why we are seeing a slight slowdown in the in the number of applications, construction starts and completions.
‘However our reports over the past five years show us in the right places, towers allow us to use the finite resource of land very efficiently.’
The vast majority of new skyscrapers will be residential, including the Millharbour Quarter in Tower Hamlets (left) and 250 City Road, by Foster and Partners for Berkeley Homes (right)
A sketch of the planned 6-8 Bishopsgate building, one a series of new towers going up in the City of London