Hackney yoga studio fears eviction after Transport for London ‘quadruples’ rent

L-R: EETG director Krissie Nicolson, Tripspace’s Giuliana Majo, London’s deputy mayor for business Howard Dawber, Len Maloney of JC Motors, Montse Ventura of Tripspace, and Signature Brew’s Tom Bott. Photograph: Chris Hopkinson.

A yoga and dance studio in Hackney is under “threat of displacement” after being told to pay tens of thousands of pounds to renew its lease under Haggerston’s railway arches.

Tripspace, which runs classes out of Acton Mews, is asking locals to chip in to a crowdfunder so they can pay a six-month deposit of £25,500 in order to “keep their home”.

Places for London (PfL), the commercial property arm of publicly-owned Transport for London (TfL), has quadrupled the price of the lease since 2013.

Tripspace’s owners warned they would “suffer the same fate” as mechanic Len Maloney of JC Motors, who ran his shop at Hackney Arches for 40 years until he was evicted last November.

Director Giuliana Majo told the Citizen the yearly rent increases were “far outpacing” the community’s disposable income, forcing the business to ramp up efforts at an “unsustainable personal cost”.

“Despite these financial pressures, we’ve remained steadfast in our mission to bring health and wellbeing practices to everyone, especially the low-waged and the elderly,” she said.

“But this has come with significant sacrifices. To bridge the ever-widening gap between what it costs to keep our doors open and what our community can afford, we’ve had to take on additional jobs, work exhausting hours, and offer services at little or no cost.”

Other arch tenants include florists, fishmongers, restaurants, studios, and event spaces.

The East End Trades Guild (EETG), an alliance of 400 small businesses in east London, slammed TfL’s “blanket market-driven approach” for “killing off small businesses” valuable to the local community.

The group said it was confused by the scale of the lease hike, especially given that neighbouring taproom Signature Brew E8 also had its lease up for renewal, but had not seen its deposit increase.

EETG director Krissie Nicolson criticised TfL’s property company for following the example of privately-owned Arch Company in seeking market rent for all small businesses.

“The Guild has long argued that social value leases, as used by other public landlords such as Islington Council to maintain and grow social value, would enable small businesses like Tripspace Yoga and Dance and JC Motors to thrive,” Ms Nicholson said.

They also suggested TfL had deliberately “eroded” those firms on its estate that it did not deem profitable enough.

“It is these very businesses that have been the engines behind the market value in the first place, through their creativity, blood, sweat and tears, making the area safer and a desirable destination for London’s residents and global investors alike,” the group said.

PfL disputed this was the case, and told the Citizen it was “committed to working in partnership with our tenants in Hackney”.

“[They] are doing a brilliant job serving their local communities while paying a fair, market rent. We have no intention of selling all or part of our arches’ estate.”

Meanwhile, guild members have organised a roundtable with City Hall’s deputy mayors and Hackney mayor Caroline Woodley at the Town Hall in May, in the hope of finding a site for a Community Land Trust.

This would enable local traders to take Hackney’s arches into community ownership – a move Mayor of London Sadiq Khan committed to in 2021.

In December, Tripspace director Ms Majo lobbied Khan at a People’s Question Time event at City Hall over this promise, to which he said: “We’ve got to sort this out.”

Cllr Jon Narcross (Labour) told the Citizen he and his Haggerston Labour colleagues were “deeply concerned” by the situation, and gave their support to EETG’s campaign.

“Small businesses like Tripspace Yoga and Dance, and the already-displaced JC Motors, represent the backbone of our community economy,” he said.

“The current approach of demanding excessive deposits and implementing market-driven rent increases is pushing out established businesses that have helped build our community and provided much-needed employment for local people.”

“The empty arches we’re now seeing represent lost jobs, lost services, and lost community value. We must ensure our local businesses get the fair treatment they deserve so they can help our community to thrive.”

The Hackney mayor’s office was approached for comment.

You can support Tripspace at crowdfunder.co.uk/p/support-tripspace.