Care home for former hotel
Littlewick Road: Appeal overturns council’s refusal
An application to turn a disused hotel into a residential care home has been successful – despite being previously rejected by the Royal Borough.
In April 2019, Windsor Clinical & Home Care Services applied for a change of use for Riders Country House Hotel in Bath Road.
The company applied to make changes such as landscaping, amenity space, a rear porch extension and space for parking several cars. The plans have been tweaked but remain largely the same.
The current building is a two-storey building of 20 bedrooms. Windsor Clinical & Home Care Services is looking to change this into an 18-bed care home with communal areas.
The application was denied in January last year on the basis that the proximity of vulnerable residents to the A4 made it an unsafe location.
It was also deemed to be in an unsustainable location due to the distance to other shops and lack of public transport options.
However, an independent planning inspector has concluded that the site would be an acceptable location for a residential care home.
The report noted there have been no personal injury accidents in the vicinity of the appeal site in the most recent five-year period, assuaging fears of dangers to residents.
Inspector H Porter also rejected the notion that the residents would be isolated or that the area was unsustainable, writing: “Although the appeal site is situated in a wider rural area … it is neither expressly isolated nor wholly remote from services and facilities.
“The future residents’ day-to-day needs, including social activities, would have to be met in-house.
“Taking [this] into consideration, the future occupiers would not, in my judgement, become isolated, and their essential or mental health needs would be all satisfactorily provided for.”