Developer vows to fight to bring Faraday Plaza to Newbury

It follows a decision by West Berkshire Council planning committee last Wednesday not to renew permission for the scheme, on London Road Industrial Estate, which expired in 2012.
Faraday Developers Limited was granted planning permission for the £50m scheme, which comprises retail and housing space – 30 per cent of which would be affordable – an 80-bedroom hotel and restaurant and an additional exit and entrance road onto the A339, in May 2009.
FDL director Duncan Crook said this week that council officers had been wrong to advise members of the western area planning committee that additional conditions could not be imposed on to the application – a measure, he argued, that could have quelled members concerns.
At last week’s meeting, chief planning officer Michael Butler said that committee members only had power to approve or refuse the renewal of the application exactly as it stood.
It followed officer recommendations for refusal owing to a “lack of information”.
Mr Butler said that Mr Crook had failed to provide a feasibility study into the impact of the plaza’s retail provision on the nearby trade in Northbrook Street, and the impact of parking capacity with a “lack of a comprehensive travel plan”.
He went on to describe Mr Crook’s retail assessment as “not adequate in the council’s opinion”.
He added: “This has not been assisted by the applicant’s apparent unwillingness to submit additional highways information and the retail information which we have requested on a number of occasions, at least a year ago.
“There are some superb benefits which could be achieved in terms of the regeneration of this part of Newbury, as well as additional housing. However, what’s also very clear is that officers are not in a position to recommend this application in the absence of the required information.”
Mr Crook said that FDL was not obliged to submit a feasibility assessment as retail space was below the required 2,500 sq m threshold, and suggested that the committee imposed the condition that retail space should remain below this level to ensure that future applications did not change this.
He added that the feasibility study was likely to cost between £25,000 and £35,000, which was a great expense for a development not guaranteed to go ahead.
While FDL has a long freehold on the site, West Berkshire Council is the landowner, and in April it appointed St Modwen as the developer with which it intends to work to redevelop a large part of the industrial estate, after inviting developers to suggest plans for its regeneration.
Mr Crook has now lodged a complaint with West Berkshire Council and urged that the application is brought back to committee.
A final decision on the scheme will not be published until the complaint has been investigated. Mr Crook added that if the application were refused, the decision would be challenged on appeal.