People in South Bristol are being asked for their views about the next stage of the biggest housing development in the city this century.
Bristol City Council’s housing development company Goram Homes is about to embark on the second phase of the huge Hengrove Park development, which will eventually see 1,435 new homes built on the site of the park between Hengrove and Hartcliffe.
Work has already begun on new homes on the entrance road to the leisure centre and hospital, and now Goram Homes are asking for views on what they are calling ‘Phase 1B’ - around 200 new homes on the eastern side of the South Bristol Community Hospital.
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They are hosting a public event next week where people can see more of what’s planned, and have also set up an online survey and consultation website for this next phase of the development.
Council planners finally gave planning permission for Hengrove Park to be developed in 2021, after years of talking about it, and last year the council ditched a process to find a private developer to take on the project, and instead handed the job over to the council’s own housebuilding firm Goram Homes.
The first phase of council housing being built at a site known as ‘The Bookends’ off Hengrove Boulevard, the main road into the hospital and leisure centre campus, which is already well underway, is being built by The Hill Group.
Phase 1B will see around 200 new homes, ranging from one-bed apartments to four-bed houses, built using modern methods of construction and fabricated off-site to produce ‘high quality, sustainable homes with reduced disruption onsite’.
The phase 1B will be on the land to the east of the South Bristol Community Hospital and the parkland to the west of the St Giles Estate in Hengrove.
A masterplan for Hengrove Park shows that the entire parkland won’t be built on - in fact a total of 22 hectares of green space will be kept green, including the Mounds nature reserve, the open spaces to the east of the park either side of Bamfield Road, and the existing park to the north and east of the site, that backs on to the St Giles Estate.
But the cycle track, spaces around the hospital and the college, as well as the centre of Hengrove Park either side of the old Whitchurch Airport runway will be built on. The entire project also includes an on-site energy centre, which will be built during this phase, and will connect the community to low carbon heating and hot water.
The huge housebuilding plans in South Bristol, which could see more than 13,000 new homes built in the BS3, BS13, BS4 and BS14 this decade have prompted concerns that South Bristol’s existing infrastructure - particularly schools and GP and health services, won’t be able to cope - a warning sounded by South Bristol MP Karin Smyth recently.
Goram Homes said that under the planning conditions granted by Bristol City Council, they will make a one-off £90,000 contribution to the local GP surgery for building Hengrove Park - although this equates to only £62 per new home from the development, which could see more than 3,000 extra residents in the area.
Goram Homes is hosting a feedback event where people can see the plans. This is taking place on Tuesday, February 21, between 4pm and 7pm at the Winter Gardens room at the South Bristol Skills Academy on Hengrove Boulevard.
The project team will use the feedback received during the consultation to inform a planning application which will be submitted to Bristol City Council in April.
“The Mayor pledged to get Bristol building again and to deliver much needed new homes for the city,” said Cllr Tom Renhard, the council’s cabinet lead on housing. “Last year Bristol built 2,563 new homes with 474 of these being affordable. Hengrove Park will help us continue to tackle the housing crisis by building another 1,435 new homes – more than 700 of them affordable. It’s incredibly exciting to see detailed plans come through the next phase. I’m also pleased to see the park being improved as such a central part of the development, something for the wider community to enjoy for generations to come,” he added.
Stephen Baker, managing director of Goram Homes, added: “This is an important next step for a landmark South Bristol development. I’d encourage the community to get involved and feedback on our plans, to help us create the best possible new community for Hengrove.”
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