Stanmore tube station in North London is the latest London Underground site that’s been earmarked to have a housing development added to it. If their plans go ahead, then around 280 new flats are to be built on part of the car park.

It’s all part of a programme delivering around 500 homes across three station car park sites in Harrow — at Stanmore, Canons Park and Rayners Lane stations.

The car park at Stanmore is quite a large one, and is often used as a drop-off point for people visiting Wembley Stadium, which is just a few stops away on the Jubilee line. Currently it has 450 parking places, managed by NCP, and this will be reduced to around 300. They are added 150 secure cycle parking spaces, which might finally see the currently totally unused cycle lanes outside the station finally getting some traffic.

These proposals will also enable — currently unspecified — improved step-free access to the station, which is currently only accessible via steps from the platform, or a long winding ramp up to the street.

The station at Stanmore is already seeing housing built up next to it, on the other side from the car park, where an old office block was recently torn down and replaced with a cluster of flats. A series of consultations are taking place this year, with planning permission expected to be sought early next year.

One of the responses to the current consultation complained that the “shops are not easy walking distance. Have any of the designers walked this distance themselves?” The town centre shops are about 5 minutes away on foot, and all the buses that go from the station go through the town centre.

Many of the comments note that due to the terminus location of the station, the car park is already straining to cope with demand, and some suggest the addition of a multi-story car park to offset the loss of space.

If the development goes ahead, then the first homes — all be be sold as “affordable” — will go on sale from 2022.