委员会决定215家计划在官再保险commendations for approval

A long-awaited key housing allocation for 215 homes is set to be discussed by a planning committee tomorrow.

The council's planning team is recommending approval for 215 homes on land south of Harvest Hill Road – this site is known as AL13 in the Borough Local Plan (BLP).

This is part of the Southwest Maidenhead Allocation, which is generally understood to mean the areas around Maidenhead Golf Course.

The overall allocation includes the development of 2,600 dwellings.

This bit is part of the Harvest Hill Road Neighbourhood, covering 8.52 hectares.

There would be 140 houses and 75 apartments, ranging from one-bed flats to five-bed houses.

The apartments would be in seven different blocks: three blocks by the main access, four along the central green spine and one in the north-east corner of the site.

The majority of the housing is two and a half and three storeys high and the apartment blocks are three to four storeys.

Thirty per cent of the housing is proposed to be affordable; 45 per cent of this will be social rent (two-, three- and four-bed housing), 35 per cent affordable rent (one and two-bed flats), and 20 per cent shared ownership (two-bed flats and two-bed houses).

The proposal includes 387 parking spaces, with the parking for the apartment blocks in separate courtyards.

Two formal play areas are planned, with southern section of the site proposed to be informal open space. The total amount of open space provision is 3.26 hectares.

Officers in the Borough’s planning team are recommending this for approval but cannot make the decision themselves due to the magnitude of the project and the decision.

They are favour largely due to the 65 affordable housing units proposed.

The plan would also ‘provide the necessary funding’ to support the infrastructure expected and supported in the South West Maidenhead supplementary planning document (SPD).

It will also contribute funding towards the Borough’s carbon off-setting fund and ‘would deliver significant biodiversity net gain on site,’ officers wrote.

As such, they recommend approval subject to the developer providing open space, private access footpaths and maintenance, and making a travel plan – among other requirements.

The decision will be made by the Maidenhead Development Panel at a meeting scheduled for tomorrow night (Wednesday, October 18).

Bray Parish Councilrecommended this application for refusal in April,and the same forthe revised plans in August.