Croxley Green History - Leukaemia Research - Croxley Green History Project

Leukaemia Research Ownership 1977 - 2013

When the school closed in 1975 and it was purchased by Leukaemia Research in 1977 who used the building to store Christmas cards and traded as LRF Trading before changing their name to Leukaemia & Lymphoma Research Trading Ltd. They stopped using the building commercially in 2008 and you can see from the photographs that there was no upkeep of the building.

Yorke Road School in Leukaemia Research ownership

A photograph from 2008

2010 with no upkeep of the building

2011 taken just before the bulldozer arrived.

In March 2009, Leukaemia Research made a planning application to demolish the former school and replace with modern town houses. In December 2009 Three Rivers District Council refused the planning appeal stating; "The impact of dismissing this appeal will not be the protection of the building in the future. It will merely allow the increased value between conversion and redevelopment to benefit another commercial party rather than the appellant and their charitable work."

Wednesday 8th June 2011 a sad day for Croxley Green

Demolition starts

Demolition continues

Demolition is swift

TRDC and the Police arrive to issue a stopping order as correct procedures had not been followed

A small victory for local resident but at a high cost as the demolition crew leave

A clear view of the destruction caused by Leukaemia Research

Leaving the school after the partial demolition

In the online edition of the Watford Observer Wednesday 8th June 2011 it said; Council leader Ann Shaw reacted furiously to the news. She told the Watford Observer: “It’s a disgrace and just total vandalism. It’s so sad because the company (Leukaemia Research) know how strongly the residents feel and they have just ignored that. The first thing we knew about it was this afternoon when we were told and the first thing we did was to get a stopping order in place. They start without any notice to us and it just shows the approach they have to this very important building.”

A clear view of the destruction caused by Leukaemia Research

Leukaemia Research had not followed correct demolition procedures when attempting to demolish this locally listed building and so a stopping order was issued by TRDC

Whilst a sad day for local residents, a post script to the events was that on the following day a gentleman arrived from a gas company to turn the gas off and so it could have been a far more disastrous day should there have been an explosion.

Below is the Archaeological "Desk Based" Assessment prepared for Leukaemia Research in preparation for their planned demolition of the former Yorke Road School.