The approved plans meant a £1.6m proposed contribution to a new secondary school for Cottam was dropped - with affordable housing prioritised instead 🏫
However, the developer argued that the scheme would not be financially viable if it had to make the payment – and also initially insisted that it could not afford any of the other cash and in-kind contributions that would ordinarily be demanded of it for an estate of the size proposed. Those would usually include a commitment to 30 percent of the dwellings being classed as ‘affordable’.
That sum includes the £1.6m sought by Lancashire County Council for 64 extra secondary school places, as well as £3.3m towards the cost of the under-construction East-West link road to facilitate development in North West Preston, £5.6m to subsidise the affordable housing quota and £3.1m in what is known as “community infrastructure levy” , a pot used to fund local facilities needed as result of housing developments.
Katie Delaney, the agent acting for the developer on the application, said that while the absence of funding for secondary school places was “clearly regrettable”, it was “outweighed by [ensuring] the delivery of the site”. She warned that the scheme may never get off the ground if planning permission were made conditional on the requested financial contributions being met in full.
At 20 percent affordable homes provision, the possible cash commitment would fall to £1.95m – still enough for the secondary school places – while at 30 percent, it was found only the CIL could be provided, as that level of affordable housing would cost the company £5.6m. He added: “[It] makes us look…stupid if we pass something that has zero secondary school [funding] when we have a secondary school crisis in that part of Preston.”
He also reminded his colleagues that the proposed Wain Homes development was on land that had been earmarked for housing under the city’s local plan – and warned that rejecting it could mean that other, less desirable, plots “north of the M55 and east of the M6” could have to be be opened up for housebuilding in order for Preston to meet its minimum new housing targets.
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