Pending approval for new school

PLANNING permission for a new £25m, 900-pupil school is set to be approved next week.

Trinity Academy St Edward’s will move from its temporary home on Eastgate in the town centre to Broadway, Kingstone, with the green light set to be given by planning board members on Tuesday.

According to a report, it will open in September 2024 and have 90 staff, catering for youngsters aged between 11 and 16.

The proposed school – which has faced considerable delays since the plan was revealed two years ago – consists of a main, rectangular, multi-storey teaching block with an adjacent square sports hall, and a 140-space car park.

Access would be from Keresforth Close which is directly accessed from the A6133 Broadway via a signalled junction, despite local councillors raising concerns over the road’s ability to deal with more traffic.

The site – which once housed an NHS facility – is included for up to 150 homes in Barnsley Council’s local plan development blueprint but this is set to be altered in order for the ‘much-needed’ school’s arrival.

The report said: “The site is allocated for mixed use in the local plan comprising of residential use and greenspace with an indicative residential yield of 150 dwellings.

“The proposal therefore represents a departure from the local plan in relation to the site specific allocation policy.

“However, the need to provide additional secondary school places across the central planning area is considered to attract substantial weight, particularly in the context of the urgent need for additional places and the lack of alternative sites being available.”