New look at plans for 500 new homes
PLANS to build 500 homes on the edge of Bristol to fund a new arena and hotel complex have taken a step forward.
Bristol Sport has published the first images of the new development they are calling Longmoor Village, which is on a green field site between Ashton Vale and the Long Ashton Park and Ride.
The sports organisation will build on part of the land originally earmarked for a new stadium for Bristol City, which fell through in the early 2010s following a lengthy battle with residents.
The £118million project will see money made from the housing development funding ambitious plans for a big venue next to the existing stadium that will provide a home for the Bristol Flyers basketball team, as well as be a conference centre and indoor events venue. Plans for the Sporting Quarter have been scaled back following feedback from the community and city planners.
A pre-application for Longmoor Village has now been made to Bristol City Council.
A new round of consultations with people who live around the Ashton Gate stadium in BS3 and near the Longmoor Village site in Ashton Vale has taken place, but stadium bosses said they are still open to comments.
The land proposed by Ashton Gate Stadium and billionaire owner Steve Lansdown is around half of the area originally earmarked for a new stadium when, in around 2010, he began a long and ultimately unsuccessful fight to move the stadium around half a mile south onto a greenfield site to the west of Ashton Vale.
Half of the land was registered as a Town and Village Green by those campaigning against the stadium – a move which ultimately stopped the plan, and instead Mr Lansdown switched focus to the huge redevelopment of the existing Ashton Gate stadium into what is now Bristol’s biggest venue.
Since then, the new Metrobus road has crossed the site, splitting it in two, with the Town Green land to the south and a single green field to the north, which is where Longmoor Village would effectively become a new suburb of Bristol.
“The proposals will be submitted in outline and allow for high quality community space interspersed between buildings to create a village atmosphere and sense of community,” a spokesperson said.
The developers also pledged that the boundary of the development will be the Metrobus road, and no development is proposed on the other side of that.
Despite being a greenfield site on the edge of the city, the land was allocated for residential development in the city council’s initial draft Local Plan document last year.
It has the m2 Metrobus road on two sides, a 1,500-space park and ride site next to it, and on the northeast side, the new Ashton Rise development has left space for the possibility of restoring Ashton Gate train station on the Portishead line into Temple Meads, if it is included in later phases of the 10-year West of England plan.
The developers said the new Longmoor Village will be accessed from the B3128 road, which currently links the Park and Ride at Long Ashton to the A370 Long Ashton bypass.
The tallest residential buildings on the site will be five storeys. “Whilst the layout is not fixed at outline stages, broad locations for the tallest buildings will ensure that height is located away from Ashton Vale,” said a spokesperson for Ashton Gate.
The developers propose ‘approximately’ 500 new homes, consisting of two, three and four bedroom units in a “high-quality urban village environment” which will include affordable housing to help meet local need.
Our vision is to create a worldclass sporting quarter for the city of Bristol, driven by our desire to use sport to change people’s lives for the better
Ashton Gate spokesperson
How much of the 500 homes will be proposed as affordable – either social housing for low, council or housing association rent, or through a shared ownership scheme – will be revealed when the full, formal planning application is submitted later this winter.
Under Bristol City Council’s planning policies, 500 homes should result in 150 affordable homes, but the developers could offset that requirement against the costs of providing facilities at the Sporting Quarter nearby, and potentially argue the 30 per cent requirement should be reduced.
The 500 homes at Longmoor Village, and the 140 flats in the Sporting Quarter plan are part of eight separate development proposals that amount to as many as 4,500 new homes either being built, with planning permission, or being proposed – all on sites within 800 yards of Ashton Gate.
Plans for hotels, a sports and convention centre and residential blocks of flats next to Ashton Gate Stadium itself have changed a lot since they were first unveiled around two years ago.
The fourth set of plans have scaled back the size and height of the buildings, and the number of hotels, but they still represent a massive development and investment in this corner of BS3.
The plans will mean the levelling of existing businesses there, including Wickes DIY store and an aerial platform business.
Ashton Gate have now said the plans include a 4,000 seat capacity sports and convention centre, which will be home to the Bristol Flyers basketball team, as well as hosting community events, conventions and be capable of hosting entertainment.
Attached to that centre will be an 11-storey high, four-star hotel with 230 rooms. “It will enable the sports and convention centre to attract prestigious national and international events by providing on-site accommodation,” a spokesperson for Ashton Gate said.
Next to that will be a 540-space multi-storey car park on the Wickes site next to the existing access to the stadium on Wedlock Way between the DIY store and KFC.
There will also be a new club retail shop and gym, an “arrival plaza” at either end next to an “enhanced” Colliters Brook.
There will also be residential units and office space at the corner of Marsh Road and fronting onto Winterstoke Road. The one on Winterstoke Road will actually be the tallest building in the complex – 140 one and two-bed apartments in three buildings, the tallest block will be 18 storeys high – slightly taller than the first of the Bedminster Green tower blocks that recently was awarded planning permission.
Next to the largest residential building will be an office block with 30,000 square feet of office space.
“Our vision is to create a worldclass sporting quarter for the city of Bristol, driven by our desire to use sport to change people’s lives for the better, strengthening the city’s sporting prowess from the highest professional levels to grass roots community sports,” said a spokesperson.