Plan to turn store into flats hailed as ‘creative’

EARLY plans to convert a landmark store in Leeds into student flats have been described as “positive and creative” by city planning chiefs.

A pre-application paper went before members of a plans panel outlining proposals to convert the former Debenhams building on Briggate into “flexible commercial uses” – while adding two extra floors for student flats.

According to a document produced by planning officers, the basement, ground and first floors would remain for commercial use, while student accommodation would be added on the second and third floors.

A two-storey roof extension to replace the existing roof extension built in the 1990s is also included.

A representative of developer Orchard Street Investment Management said: “The building is getting a bit tired and some of the interventions are not very flattering to the building – we want to give it a new lease of life.”

He said the basement, ground and first floor would be reconfigured as commercial space, while the rest would be used for student residential use.

“The quantity of space exceeds a lot of student accommodation schemes in the city centre. We want to provide a number of different types of outdoor space.”

Upper floors of the building would, under the plans, be given over to student accommodation and be made up of 124 “bedspaces” in 90 studio flats, and 17 “duel occupancy” studios, which the document dubs “twodios”.

Commenting on the pre-application, Coun David Blackburn (Green) said: “A number of years ago, I ran a campaign for getting spaces over the top of shops open for people to live in again.

“I never dreamed of having a planning committee meeting where we would be talking about people living above the Debenhams store”.

No decision was made on the plans at this stage.