# The Waterloo Estate Regeneration

*Category: The wider town*
*Topics: regeneration, affordable housing, planning approval, romford, havering council*

The Waterloo Estate regeneration project in Romford has received planning approval for 107 affordable homes across Plots 9 and 10, with a mix of 4 and 6 storey buildings. The project is part of a larger £1 billion joint venture between Havering Council and Wates Residential to deliver 3,500 homes across the borough. The approved phase is expected to be completed by late 2028 and will include landscaped public open space and new community facilities.

## Key points

- 107 affordable homes across Plots 9 and 10
- 4 and 6 storey buildings with increased boundary setbacks
- 100% affordable housing with 70% social rent and 30% intermediate tenure
- Expected completion by late 2028
- Part of a larger £1 billion joint venture to deliver 3,500 homes

## Content

**Where the scheme stands, as of August 2026.** The consented masterplan
allows **up to 1,380 homes**. The phase that is actually approved and starting
is **107 homes across Plots 9 and 10** — the blocks that directly border
Cotleigh Road. Those are two different numbers describing two different things,
and most accounts of this scheme, including earlier versions of this page, quote
the first as though it were the second.

| | |
| --- | --- |
| Outline consent | P0761.20, November 2021 — up to 1,380 units, 3–16 storeys, 40% affordable |
| Scheme value | £450m, a 2020–21 press-era figure for the whole masterplan |
| Phase now approved | Plots 9 and 10 |
| Homes in this phase | **107** — 70 on Plot 9, 37 on Plot 10 |
| Tenure | **100% affordable** |
| Heights | Part 4 / part 6 storey, and 4 storey |
| Approved | **26 February 2026**, Strategic Planning Committee |
| Application refs | [P1293.25](https://democracy.havering.gov.uk/documents/s82868/P1293.25%20-%20Final_Waterloo%20Estate%20RM%20Committee%20ReportX.pdf) (Reserved Matters), [P1297.25](https://democracy.havering.gov.uk/documents/s82856/P1297.25%20-%20Waterloo%20Estate%20S73.pdf) (Section 73) |
| Completion | Late 2028 |

## What Plots 9 and 10 mean for Cotleigh Road

The committee report describes the site in its own words as **"bounded by Queen
Street and Cotleigh Road"**. That is a primary planning document naming this
street as a boundary of the phase now under construction — which is why this
page, rather than the borough-level figures, is the one that matters to anyone
living here.

In practice: the blocks facing Cotleigh Road are the low end of the consented
range, not the high end. Plot 9 is part four and part six storeys against an
outline consent that allowed up to sixteen; Plot 10 is a uniform four. The
[Section 73 amendments](#section-73-amendments-plots-9-and-10) below set out the
height reductions and increased boundary setbacks in detail.

## The unit count is reported three different ways

Worth knowing if you compare sources. The committee report gives **107**
(70 + 37). The [January 2026 Cabinet paper](https://democracy.havering.gov.uk/documents/s82375/08.0+HWR+12+Estates+Business+Plan+Update+PUBLIC+Final+28012026+Cabinet.pdf) gives approximately **109**
(66 + 43). Havering's own news release hedges with "more than 107".

This site uses **107**, because the committee report is the document that
actually granted the permission and its split is itemised by plot. The
discrepancy is small and probably reflects design changes between papers, but it
is real and it is not reconciled anywhere in the council's own material.

## Why a 1,380-home scheme became a 107-home phase

Construction was **paused in 2023** following the regulatory change requiring a
second staircase in residential buildings over 30 metres. The taller blocks in
the outline consent were directly affected, and the response was to re-phase:
bring forward the low-rise plots that were unaffected, and revisit the towers
later.

That is the reason the live phase is 107 homes of an eventual 1,380, and a
scheme description that omits it makes the current position look like a
downgrade rather than a sequencing decision.

## The wider programme

The Waterloo Estate sits within the **"12 Estates"** programme, a **£1 billion
joint venture** between Havering Council and Wates Residential intended to
deliver around 3,500 homes across the borough. The joint venture continues and
its business plan was [reauthorised by Cabinet in January 2026](https://democracy.havering.gov.uk/documents/s82375/08.0+HWR+12+Estates+Business+Plan+Update+PUBLIC+Final+28012026+Cabinet.pdf) — but
work on later phases at six of the twelve estates is currently paused, expected
to remain so for around twelve months, and the underlying financial case sits
in exempt appendices withheld from the public.

Havering's own page for this site is
[Waterloo & Queen Street](https://www.havering.gov.uk/building-new-homes-havering-1/12-sites-regeneration-waterloo-queen-street).

## Scope and vision

The full masterplan objective is demolition of the mid-twentieth-century
housing stock and its replacement with a master-planned community of **up to
1,380 residences** — the ceiling permitted by the outline consent, delivered
over multiple phases across many years, not a figure for any single approval.

The scope goes beyond housing delivery into place-making. The design philosophy
creates protective architectural boundaries against the harsh infrastructure of
the railway and the A125 dual carriageway, while weaving a continuous "green and
blue thread" through the centre of the site. That thread guides pedestrian
traffic from the intense urban intersections to the south, through the new
development, to the tranquility of Cottons Park in the northwest.

Village greens, raingardens and a new central park maximise biodiversity and
provide a new setting for the Grade II listed **St Andrew's Church**,
establishing it as a historic focal point in the modernised landscape.

## St Andrew's Church as a working building

The masterplan treats St Andrew's as a heritage object to be framed. It is also
a building in daily use, and what happens inside it says more about the
neighbourhood than its listing does.

The church runs a weekly **Wednesday community café** on a pay-what-you-can-
afford basis, and a free playgroup, **Little Fishes**, for parents and young
children. Both are the kind of provision that does not appear in a planning
document but is what a resident on Cotleigh Road would actually encounter.

It also serves as the worship home of the **Romanian Orthodox Parish of
Romford**, a reflection of how much Romford's population has changed in twenty
years. In **November 2025** the parish marked the Feast of the Entry of the
Virgin Mary into the Temple with a Divine Liturgy presided over by **His
Eminence Atanasie, Romanian Orthodox Archbishop of Great Britain and
Ireland**, with visiting clergy — a diocesan-level occasion held a few minutes
from Cotleigh Road.

A Grade II listed Anglican building hosting an Eastern Orthodox parish, a
pay-what-you-can café and a toddler group is a fair picture of this part of
Romford: older fabric, newer congregation, and a good deal of use.

- [St Andrew's Church, Romford](https://www.standrewsromford.org.uk/)
- [Romanian Orthodox Archdiocese of Great Britain and Ireland — the Romford parish's Feast of the Entry of the Virgin Mary into the Temple](https://roarch.org.uk/the-romanian-orthodox-parish-of-romford-celebrated-the-feast-of-the-the-entry-of-the-virgin-mary-into-the-temple-in-a-spirit-of-prayer-and-communion/)

## Section 73 amendments: Plots 9 and 10

The buildings directly adjacent to Cotleigh Road — designated **Plots 9 and
10** — underwent intense scrutiny following extensive public consultation with
Cotleigh Road residents through 2024 and early 2025.

In early 2026 the joint venture submitted a **Section 73 application
(P1297.25)** to the Strategic Planning Committee, alongside a detailed
**Reserved Matters Application (P1293.25)**, to formally amend the approved
development parameters. The objective was to improve deliverability while
mitigating visual and physical impact on the existing low-rise properties along
Cotleigh Road.

The approved amendments represent a substantial scaling back of the initial
massing:

**Height reductions.** Maximum building height on Plot 9 (the southern block)
was cut from an approved 8 storeys to a staggered 6 and 4 storeys. Plot 10 (the
northern block) was rationalised from a varying 2-to-5 storey mass into a
uniform 4-storey structure. Both changes were explicitly designed to lessen
visual impact on the residential receptors along Cotleigh Road.

**Enhanced setbacks.** To protect privacy, daylight and sunlight for existing
properties, minimum separation distances from the site boundaries were
increased. The northern boundary of Plot 9 was pushed back to **7.75 metres**
(from an original 5 metres), and the minimum southern boundary of Plot 10
expanded to **6.3 metres**.

**Structural rationalisation.** The redesign consolidated multiple smaller,
fragmented blocks into single coherent linear buildings. By keeping every
building under 18 metres, the developers avoided restrictive "high-risk"
building classifications, and removed complex dual-core arrangements to
facilitate faster delivery.

**Design and materials.** External finishes are specified as a mixture of light
buff and darker brick tones — architectural variety within a cohesive visual
language that respects the surrounding historical context, including the
adjacent church.

Despite the massing reductions, social efficacy is undiluted: Plots 9 and 10
still deliver **107 residential units at 100 per cent affordable housing**,
split 70 per cent social rent and 30 per cent intermediate tenure, alongside new
community-use floorspace.

## Interim community integration

The regeneration is already integrating with the existing community. On **22
July 2023** a new community garden opened on Cotleigh Road — an example of
"meanwhile use", the practice of putting development land to community benefit
before primary construction begins. Designed with local residents and an urban
garden specialist and sponsored by the joint venture's supply chain, it features
raised beds, arts and crafts areas and communal seating, and was handed over to
local residents as a shared open amenity rather than retained by the developer.

That handover is the part worth noting. Meanwhile-use schemes are often
temporary in a way that means "until we need the land back"; this one was given
over to the people already living around it, on a site whose permanent
buildings are still years away. It is reported in the council's
[news archive for July 2023](https://www.havering.gov.uk/news?year=2023&month=7&page=2).

In **May 2025**, planning permission was secured to install temporary modular
homes on the site to address acute local housing pressure during the demolition
phase, specifically for Havering families experiencing homelessness, with first
occupancies anticipated by Q1 2026.

## Approval, February 2026

The applications described above were determined on **26 February 2026**, when
Havering Council and Wates Residential secured planning approval for Blocks 9
and 10 — the blocks immediately adjacent to Cotleigh Road. The approval carries
the **107 affordable homes** through to consent, along with landscaped public
open space and new community facilities.

The council's account of the decision credits consultation with neighbouring
residents for shaping the scheme's final height, balcony design and screening —
which is the same set of changes the Section 73 amendments above describe, now
carried into an approved permission rather than a proposed one.

For Cotleigh Road specifically this is the point at which the reduced massing
stops being a proposal. The 6-and-4-storey Plot 9, the uniform 4-storey Plot 10
and the increased boundary setbacks are what has consent.

- [Havering Council: planning approval secured for the Waterloo and Queen Street site](https://www.havering.gov.uk/news/article/1713/planning-approval-secured-for-waterloo-and-queen-street-site-in-romford)
- [The Havering Daily, 6 March 2026](https://thehaveringdaily.co.uk/2026/03/06/planning-approved-romfords-biggest-housing-project-moves-forward-as-block-9-and-10-get-the-green-light/)

## Related on this site

- [Romford Town Centre Masterplan](/romford-masterplan) — the statutory
  framework this sits inside
- [Nearby streets and the regeneration boundary](/nearby-streets-and-regeneration)
  — what changes at street level
- [The history of Romford town centre](/romford-history) — why there is a
  Waterloo Road here at all, and the barrack ground the estate is built on
- [House values on Cotleigh Road](/house-values) — what the houses beside it
  are currently estimated at

## Source

- Canonical URL: https://cotleighroad.com/waterloo-estate
- Typed record: https://cotleighroad.com/index.json