High-rise plan is thrown out again

At a meeting last Wednesday evening, West Berkshire Council’s western area planning committee agreed with officers recommendations and that plans put forward by developer Nelson Geneva for 166 houses at Sterling Industrial Estate, Kings Road, be refused.
The architectural plans, showing seven-storey high blocks, had been submitted by Sutton Griffin.
The land, said to be one of the most contaminated in Berkshire according to the Environment Agency, which would cost an estimated £2m to clean up, is the former home of Sterling Cables, and has been the subject of a protracted tug-of-war between the district council and developers in recent years.
The council had earmarked the area for a relief road from Hectors Way to Kings Road to alleviate traffic on the A339 and, as they stand, the redevelopment plans do not allow for this road to be built. The application was refused for this reason.
Patrick Griffin from Sutton Griffin, who spoke at the meeting, said that they could not afford to decontaminate the site as well as build the relief road.
He said: “Doing nothing is not an option. It’s about contamination from this site going to other areas.”
Business owners and residents affected by the proposals, also had their say during the meeting.
Suzanne Davis, who lives in Boundary Road, said: “I have great concern about the impact it will have on my enjoyment of living there and my privacy.”
Joss Nankoo of Stone Art Memorials, Kings Road, whose business would be forced to relocated if the development went ahead, said: “The site is quite unsightly – it’s in a terrible location and not really a place you would like to live. My business is thriving, why destroy it because of greed?”
However, Brian Withers who represented Sterling Garage, Kings Road, described the proposal as a golden opportunity for the council.
He said: “Our business is suffering because the site has declined; it's almost derelict.”
The proposals were refused by all bar one committee member.
After the meeting, ward member David Allen (Lib Dem, Victoria) said that if there had been no question of the relief road, the proposals would have been given the go-ahead.
However, he said that "West Berkshire Council has always realised that there has to be a road at some point to relieve the traffic. It is incredibly important. If the industrial estate is developed and there’s no road – that’s it, we have lost the opportunity to relieve the traffic.
“The developer will pay for decontamination, but the balance against that is that the road is so important.”
The design director at Sutton Griffin, Ian Blake, said that the firm was still unsure as to what the next step would be – whether there would be an appeal, and whether there were good grounds for appeal.
He said that the site had been in a poor state for years and that there was no reason why it wouldn’t continue like that for the same time again.
“It’s very frustrating,” he said, adding that he hoped that, if there were a solution, the developer would work with the council to try and achieve it, or take legal advice about making a justifiable appeal.