Preston makes affordable concession to support 360-home scheme
The city council has waived the chance to secure a contribution to affordable housing in the future so that Heaton Group’s restoration of the 19th-century Park Hall can go ahead.
Heaton Group wants to deliver a 65-bed aparthotel within the former hotel building and 360 apartments in two new-build blocks at the city centre site overlooking Avenham and Miller parks.
The plans were approved in February. At the time, Heaton Group said the scheme could not support the delivery of affordable homes due to viability constraints.
Normally, when plans are approved without a policy-compliant level of affordable homes, a mechanism is written into the Section 106 agreement to allow a scheme’s viability to be reassessed in the future.
If the situation has improved, the authority could press a developer to provide affordable homes.
Since February, Heaton Group and Preston City Council have been in talks about the project’s viability.
The city council has now concluded that the viability outlook for the project is unlikely to improve to a point where the delivery of affordable homes would be possible, due largely to the cost of restoring the historic buildings on the site.
A report compiled by Preston’s planning department states: “The applicant asserts that a review mechanism is threatening to prevent the scheme from being brought forward, thus jeopardising the future use and protection of these important heritage assets.”
As a result, the authority has waived its right to reassess the project’s affordability in the future in order to allow the scheme to progress.
To find out more about the most recent plans for the site, search for application number 06/2023/0509 on Preston City Council’s planning portal.
DAY Architectural is the architect and Paul Butler Associates is advising on planning. Also on the project team is landscape architect DEP Landscape Architecture, transport consultant SK Transport, and noise consultant RED Acoustics.
