An Outline Planning Application has been submitted for the Skindles - Severnside - Paper Mill area. Although this is not a "detailed" planning application, there is a mass of detail available through the South Bucks Planning Portal. See application number
09/00476/OUT
The major differences from the plans presented at the
first exhibition are:
- Much larger hotel building
- No tennis club
- No residential units on the boatyard site
- Fewer dwellings on the Severnside and Mill sites
- Taller buildings in most areas
The pictures below were taken at the on-site exhibition, and may help you to get a feel for the overall plan. Click on a picture to get a larger version. (Some of these are too large for
dial-up modems: you need broadband to download them in a sensible length of time).
Please look at the pictures, look at the documents on the Planning Portal mentioned above, and make your views known to the Planning Authority. We would be grateful if you would also post your comments here for others to see.
The Committee's views on this application are summarised in the Spring 2009 Newsletter
The Environmental and Energy Conservation statement is rather disappointing. The consultants have completely ignored the best source of renewable energy on site: The River Thames itself! This was the site of a large water-powered mill for centuries, and the power is still available. Read my estimates on
hydro-power at the Mill to see what they have missed...
Euan Felton writes:
Neil Blundell, Mary Trevallion,Iris Midlane, Don Bradbury and myself held a
meeting with Paul Fong and Guy Wakefield of Hunter Page planning at their
request last Tuesday evening.
The purpose of the meeting was to hear new proposals and alterations to the
current application which Hunter Page wished to propose.
These were the points put forward from the Hunter Page side:
- The footbridge is proposed to be re-introduced with funding as a third South Bucks, a third Windsor and Maidenhead and a third by the developers. It would be positioned towards the South end of Boulters lock island. There may be a competition to design it.
- The closure of Mill Lane at the Jubilee river crossing is being encouraged by the applicants and seriously considered by the highwayauthorities
- The design of the junction of Mill Lane with the A4 is being re-considered. One option may be to make it a signalised junction.
- Hunter Page are considering a hydro-electric power plant at an unspecified point on the Thames or Jubilee river. Advice is being sought from Windsor and Maidenhead, who have experience from an existing scheme near Windsor.
- The number of blocks of flats on the Mill site adjacent to the Jubilee river will be reduced from 5 to 2, though some blocks would be merged. The height of these flats will be reduced by 2 storeys. The height and positioning of other proposed new build blocks on the Mill site would remain unchanged.
- The Victorian building to the North of the existing Mill would be retained (and converted to unspecified use)
- Flood zone 3A on the Mill building line would not now be built on.
- South Bucks has requested the applicants to make comparison of the application site to other alternative sites in South Bucks in order to assist determination of whether the sequential test is required. The devolopers believe that by not building in flood zone 3a they will not have to carry out a sequential test
- Some of the proposed housing/live work units on the Severnside site will be re-positioned further away from the gasometer. The Severnside buildings height and spread is otherwise not proposed to be changed.
- The proposed hotel will be re-designed and lowered. The hotel will be moved back from the A4 to the existing building line.
- There would be consideration of altered public parking arrangements on the application site.
- The applicants are committed to dedicating the central open area and the hillside to the East of the Jubilee river to the public and are willing to sign up to a legal s106 agreement to this effect. The applicants suggested that these sites might be owned and managed by an independent body, South Bucks District Council or the Parish Council and asked the meeting to consider a way forward for this to happen.
- At this stage the applicants are not sure whether the suggested above changes will be made to the current application or be the subject of a withdrawal of the current application and submission of a new one.
- The applicants will undertake a bat survey on the Mill site starting very soon
- Hunter Page had invited the owners of the gasometer and riverside gas site to work with them on a comprehensive application to include the whole Mill Lane site. The owners had declined.
- Hunter Page agreed to produce visuals of the before and after appearance of the site, viewed from the public footpath on the East hillside
- A more comprehensive landscape plan would be produced
From the Taplow side:
- That height and spread of any new buildings are key considerations.
- That the importance and the nature of the rural landscape should be given high priority in any scheme
- That the application site is part of a very narrow neck of Green Belt between Maidenhead and Slough
- That there was extant planning guidance for various parts of the site in the South Bucks files
- That the key difference between the Maidenhead side and the South Bucks side of the river Thames is that one is urban and the other is rural.
- It was requested that the large barge moored in one of the creeks be removed and that no further clearance work would be carried out on the Mill site until a permission had been obtained.
It seems that the developers - Watchword - have been placed in administration, owing about £40M to the Irish Nationwide Building Society and also in debt to HMRC. See the
article in the Irish Times for more information.
The Maidenhead Advertiser said on July 2nd 2009 that the administrators were planning to push on with the planning application before selling the site.
re: Hunter Page Item 1 - about the proposed bridge. This is good news for a lot of people, but maybe especially cyclists!
My points of 4th November 2008 on this site remain unchanged.
The planning application was withdrawn shortly before it was due to be heard. There had been many objections by the public, and also by most of the officially-notified bodies (water authority, environment agency etc).
Please look at the pictures, look at the documents on the Planning Portal mentioned above, and make your views known to the Planning Authority. We would be grateful if you would also post your comments here for others to see.
The Committee's views on this application are summarised in the Spring 2009 Newsletter