A long-planned housing development on the edge of Chorley town centre is finally set to get off the drawing board after it was given the green light by councillors.
Members of Chorley Council’s planning committee granted permission for 62 new dwellings to be built on the site of the authority’s own works depot on the main A6 Bengal Street.
The scheme – made up of a five-storey apartment block and two rows of terrace properties – was first mooted around five years ago.
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It is one of a trio of projects being partially financed by the £20m Chorley received from the last government’s Levelling Up Fund.
The apartment building will feature 52 flats – 36 with one bedroom and 16 with two. Four of the apartments will be adaptable for wheelchair users.
The authority’s principal planning officer, Iain Crossland, said it would “provide a focal point for the development” and resemble “a traditional mill-type building”.
Meanwhile, each of the terrace housing rows will incorporate five homes, split across three floors by making use of the roof space. Eight of the total 10 houses will have three bedrooms and the remainder four.
Details of whether the properties will be offered for sale or rent have not yet been revealed, but 30 percent of them will fall into the discounted ‘affordable homes’ category, as required by local planning policy.
Planning committee members lined up to praise the proposal, which includes a communal garden area for residents and 72 parking spaces.
Cllr Chris Snow said it was a “great” design which will bring “much-needed houses [into] the town centre”.
“We’re making use of what could have been a very difficult site [to redevelop],” he added.
The meeting heard that the council-promoted project had been assessed by the authority’s independent planning officers before they had recommended it to the committee for approval.
Committee member Russ Green said it was important to show that the council had not been “marking its own homework”.
Cabinet member for planning Alex Hilton – who himself sits on the committee – said the town hall’s planning and property departments “act completely independently of each other” and stressed he was assured that “the process has been done correctly”.
Two existing properties on Stump Lane will be overlooked by the new development, but their occupants have not raised any objections and committee member Cllr Craige Southern said that it was preferable to them having to look out on “a council yard”.
The depot will relocate to the Common Bank Industrial Estate to make way for the new housing.
Chorley Council’s bid for cash from the Levelling Up Fund was initially refused in January 2023, but later approved in November that year. The authority is itself contributing more than double the £20m from Whitehall to bring the overall £44m package of projects to fruition.
As well as the Bengal Street plans, that includes the creation of a new ‘civic square’ opposite the town hall, on a site that has been operating as a car park since the demolition of the bingo hall that stood on the plot until 2021. Some commercial and residential premises will also feature within that development, which is subject to a separate planning application.
Chorley’s third levelling up scheme is the refurbishment of the council’s Union Street offices, where work is already under way to provide up to 20,000 sq ft of modern commercial accommodation.
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