Business hub gets go-ahead
ANEW business village will be built despite neighbours’ complaints about its ‘overbearing and oversized’ buildings being too close to their homes.
Plans to more than double the size of Pepper House business centre in Hazel Grove have been approved by the council.
The proposals for the five-acre site, at Bramhall Moor Industrial Park, include five new blocks, boasting 36 offices between them, on land to the east of Pepper House.
Pepper House itself will also be revamped to create 14 separate offices, while the focal point of the development will be a new ‘business hub’, featuring a cafe, meeting room and conference facilities.
In total there will be more than 5,600 sq m of office floor space for businesses compared to the 2030 sq m currently available.
The huge expansion has been designed to create a village-style environment by using streets and squares to connect its various parts.
And the clusters of new buildings set around courtyards are intended to break up the development and ‘create a sense of intimacy and a space for shared activities’.
However, the plans were not welcomed by nearby residents who lodged objections to the application - particularly over the five new blocks, which stand at nearly 10 metres tall.
Comments received by the council included fears ‘the development would create overbearing and over-sized buildings which are too close to the residential properties’ and that there would be a ‘loss of the buffer zone between houses and the employment area’.
Other concerns included a loss of daylight, an increase in light pollution and increased traffic on local road.
However, the council’s corporate director for place management and regeneration, was sufficiently reassured by the case officer’s report, which recommended approval of the scheme.
It says the distance of the business hub from the housing, coupled with the lie of the land, means it is ‘unlikely to have any material impact on residential amenity’.