London risks losing 1,000 key historic sites to decay

Nearly a thousand of London's most historic buildings, parks and monuments are at risk of decaying beyond repair, the country's leading heritage body warns today.

Simon Thurley, chief executive of English Heritage, condemned the "acts of barbarism" that allow nationally important sites to be lost forever, and called for urgent action to save them.

He said: "These are places, buildings and landscapes that have the potential to shape the quality and even the course of our lives. Yet their future is uncertain.

"In today's fast-changing society this heritage is arguably more important than ever, providing a sense of permanence and continuity, a focus for social cohesion and a sense of identity as well as a catalyst for regeneration and good new design."

The organisation today launched a new Heritage At Risk register, which reveals that 572 buildings, 153 scheduled monuments and 148 parks and gardens in London are in danger.

The list, which replaces its annual Buildings At Risk register, has been expanded to include threatened landscapes and monuments for the first time.

New entries in the buildings category include a £4 million Grade II-listed house in Belgravia's Eaton Square - one of London's most desirable addresses - and an 18th-century townhouse in Upper Grosvenor Street, Mayfair.

The Union Chapel in Islington, an Edwardian court building in West Kensington and a former theatre in Tottenham have also been added.

Landscapes and monuments making their debut on the register include the Eleanor Cross outside Charing Cross station, the Sixties Commonwealth Institute building and garden in Kensington, a 16th-century conduit that once supplied water to Eltham Palace, and Gunnersbury Park in west London. This neglected 186-acre open space was once the garden of a 17th-century Palladian house, and contains 21 listed buildings, nine of them at risk.

While 37 London buildings have been added to the register this year, another 65 others have been repaired and had their "at risk" status removed. These include the Golders Green Hippodrome, the Victorian Dulwich Leisure Centre, and an 18th-century shell grotto in a park in Ilford.

Battersea Power Station, recently promoted from Grade II listed to Grade II*, retained its at-risk rating despite a recent restoration proposal from its new owners, Treasury Holdings.

The plans include eight million square feet of shops, f lats, cafés, offices and a hotel on a 38-acre site dominated by a 100ft glass tower. English Heritage has classified the landmark power station as suffering from "slow decay".

Lord Bruce-Lockhart, chairman of English Heritage, said expanding the remit of the register meant neglected landscapes and monuments might be saved.

He said: "Our ambition is nothing less than to compile a database of all of England's designated heritage which is at risk of neglect or decay.

"The results of this first Heritage At Risk report show that everybody must live near, walk past or know of a heritage treasure at risk near them. We believe that our Heritage At Risk register will galvanise the whole nation into doing something about this before it is too late and help us save the best of the past for the future."