Neighbours have voiced worries about new housing in a Nottinghamshire area where 'they keep building and building'. The existing Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service headquarters on Bestwood Lodge Drive, near Arnold will be demolished to make way for 32 homes, if councillors follow the recommendation to grant permission for the project at Gedling Borough Council's planning committee on September 7.
The site has been occupied by Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service and is occupied by a number of two storey buildings. The fire service is relocating to the new joint Fire and Police headquarters at Sherwood Lodge with the move expected to be completed by the end of November 2022.
If approved the new homes would take the form of four different blocks after the demolition of the current structures. Local residents said they were uncertain whether the plan would improve the area, expressing concerns about a lack of services.
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Chris Jones, 60, retired, from Bestwood Village, said: “I suppose as long as they don’t encroach into the park it’s alright. But there’s no infrastructure around here, no public transport, but they keep building and building.”
Andy Keetley, 68, retired, from Bestwood, said: “I think it’s a shame that they don’t reuse it for what it is and just turn it into part of the country park because there’s very little flat areas for the kids to play on.
“I think they should open that up to the public and let people have picnics on there and kids playing football. I think they’ve missed opportunities. As for it being homes, no problem with that.
“I don’t think that’s going to have any effect on business or traffic. If it’s a residential area, it will be more day traffic instead of night which is good.”
The site is within the greenbelt and is close to a number of important heritage assets. These include Bestwood Lodge Hotel (Grade II* listed), Bestwood former stable block (Grade II listed), The Balery (Grade II listed) and the walled garden to Gaunt’s Hill (Grade II listed) to the north.
The site would be accessed via the existing vehicular access off Bestwood Lodge Drive. Within the site a road would run along the south-eastern boundary with cul-de-sac arrangements serving four blocks of dwellings.
William Greenwell, 71, a local retiree, added: “I don’t think the plans should go ahead. It’s a country park, it’s green belt.
“They could possibly build a few houses where the buildings of the Fire and Rescue Service buildings are, knock them down, but over the whole lot, no, I don’t agree with it.”
Tom Slater, 42, a tutor from Bulwell, said: “We don’t live locally, so it wouldn’t affect us but my personal view about housing is that there’s lots of housing that could be renovated in the city, rather than building in a nice landscape area.”
The Highway Authority said traffic would be "significantly reduced" by the housing project and made no objections regarding traffic impact on the local highway network. They confirmed improvements would be made to the existing highway's pedestrian facilities to allow a fit for purpose access to the development.
Nottinghamshire County Council said there was a surplus of primary school places in the planning area and the impact of the development would not lead to a deficit in provision. However the County Council said they would seek a secondary education contribution of £121,255 and a post 16 education contribution of £24,251 from the site's developers to accommodate pupil growth.
NHS Health requested a financial contribution of £17,340 to help existing local practices, which include The Practice Nirmala, Rise Park Surgery and Daybrook Medical Practice. A council planning officer concluded the project was 'acceptable' when recommending it to councillors on the planning committee.
In a Gedling Borough Council report, a planning officer said: "It is accepted that the site would be accessed from Bestwood Lodge Drive which also serves the Country Park. However this has been the situation with the Fire HQ, a hotel and a number of other residential properties. As such it is not considered that the redevelopment of the site for residential purposes would significantly change the current shared access arrangements and the Highway Authority have raised no objection.
"The principle of the development accords with the objectives of national and local planning policies. The development would result in the complete redevelopment of previously developed land, which would not have a greater impact on the openness of the Green Belt than the existing development. The development would be of an acceptable layout and density and would not have an undue impact upon visual amenity, residential amenity, highway safety, heritage assets, and ecology."
In a planning document, Frank Shaw Associates on behalf of applicant Nottinghamshire Fire and Rescue Service, said: "The character area and structural landscape strategies have helped to define the spaces and building plot configurations on the site. This in turn fixes the types of buildings and their varying degrees of formality as they interact with this spatial hierarchy."
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