A total of 2 Isle of Wight Council-owned sites will be disposed of after the authority failed to find someone who would be willing to build houses there. For years the council has been trying to find a partner to develop 2 parts of Venture Quays — the Maresfield Road Car Park and the land opposite, which is currently home to Island business Teemill, an offshoot of Rapanui. The council bought the parcels of land making up Venture Quays in 2020 for a total of £1.3 million, and as part of the deal with Homes England had to build houses on the car park and warehouse space. The deadlines for delivering the site had been pushed back twice with the latest meaning the council had to have secured planning permission by March 2024 and start development by March 2025, or risk having to sell the land back to the government for £1. Now the Isle of Wight Council has confirmed it is getting rid of 2 sites after a ‘failed procurement exercise’. The council’s internal auditor said both projects had been impacted by the dissolution of the authority’s regeneration team, as there had been changes in the senior staff responsible for them. In a report to last week’s audit committee, the internal auditor said the Housing Member Board had recently approved the disposal of the sites. A council spokesperson has said getting rid of the sites “is currently seen as the best way to bring the land forward for housing” as it is still a requirement of the contract with Homes England. The council had taken the sites off its work plan in November last year, as council leader, Councillor Phil Jordan said there was “no way of moving it forward at this stage”. The authority was looking for other options to use the land after a feasibility study in 2022 determined it had ‘severe negative viability’ and there was ‘no interest from an affordable housing provider’. The council spokesperson said the rest of the Venture Quays sites — the Albany Barracks and the Columbine Building — are excluded from this particular contract. They said the council was not looking to hand any land back to Homes England.
COUNCIL TO BIN SITES AFTER FAILING TO FIND ANYONE WHO WANTS TO BUILD HOUSES
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Surely if the local council requires housing they should have as long as required to provide them rather than some developer making money off the same project and overcharging the public? Ffs sort this idiocy out and get on with building cheaper homes for locals.
But privatisation. There is no alternative!
Oh there is. But the Council does not want to offer it’s interest rates to developers in return for delivering some of their social obligations.
The waste and incompetence of the council is staggering. So much money wasted on projects that never happen. No heads ever seem to roll. Are there ANY competent people? If so, where are they?
A year to sell or be burdened with 1.3million of debt….remind me why the IoW council tax is the 11th highest in the country.
The article does not state the location of the site but it is in East Cowes if you don’t know.
Who wants to live in East Cowes!!!!!
It does… you clearly didn’t take the info on board….
the Maresfield Road Car Park and the land opposite
But the actual location (the town) of the car park is not stated in the article. I did not know the location of this car park until I looked it up.
This land is heavily contaminated with trichloroethane and should never be built upon for homes it’s only suitable for industrial use.
Doesnt trich evaporate? How would it have got there…..engineering degreasing or dry cleaning textiles or something else?
Perhaps if the IOW Council refused all developments on greenfield sites when there were brownfield sites available they wouldn’t find themselves in this situation. Not to mention preserving the beauty of the IOW and reducing sewage outflow into the sea.
Key word here is “failed” just about the only thing Jerk Jordan and Co. are good at is failure. Oh and a few drinkies before driving home.
This has more to do with the council attempting to impose certain restictions on potential developers, I wish they would be a little more honest, there was interest in the sites but not under the conditions the council wanted.