Overruled on holiday flats' plan
A CONTROVERSIAL development of 12 holiday apartments on the site of an historic St Ives hotel has been approved by Cornwall Council despite objections from local councillors and residents.
More than 50 people wrote to Cornwall Council planners asking them to refuse permission for 12 flats at the Woodside Hotel in Belyars Lane.
St Ives Town Council lodged the "strongest possible objection" to the proposals.
But on Monday councillors on Cornwall Council's west area planning committee passed the plans.
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Residents had raised concerns that the demolition of the Woodside would remove yet another classic building from the town.
There were also concerns about overdevelopment in the lucrative Belyars Lane area – where recently five car parking spaces were sold for more than £50,000 each.
St Ives Town Council also raised practical concerns around the potential contribution to an existing flooding problem in the area and to fears that the development would affect people who use the site to walk into town.
However, the latest plans are a revised version of the original proposal.
The roof height of the new development will now be lower than the original hotel and plans for balconies overlooking neighbours have been scrapped.
Developers AB St Ives Ltd, a company registered to a London address, have also made concessions on the footpath that runs through the site and an offer of £150,000 towards affordable housing development.
Mayor of St Ives Councillor Ron Tulley said: "Partly the revised application had met some of the issues we raised, so our objections did succeed in getting the plans modified.
"There still remains a very real concern about flooding in that area and I do hope they take appropriate measures.
"The run off of water is the concern.
"Down Belyars Lane it becomes a torrent in heavy rain. The Chy-an-Albany Hotel had to put a barrier across their doors last weekend.
"It is the nature of St Ives, and lots of Cornish seaside towns, that they are built on slopes and when it rains it comes down the hills.
"Belyars Lane is a particular problem."
The footpath alongside the site is used by many locals including children walking to school, and they will now be able to continue using the path, said Mr Tulley.
Comments
by JJLee
Thursday, January 10 2013, 10:20AM
“I love St Ives and accepted a long while ago it was a lost cause. Better to be realistic and content than form a protest group and require heart bypass. I think flooding needs to be taken very serious as we move into the swamp age”