Thursday 2 February 2017

Carmarthen West Link Road news


A planning application relating to the Carmarthen West link road is due to be considered at next week's planning committee. The construction of the road was considered essential to alleviate traffic problems as the Carmarthen West Development Brief for 1200 homes progressed, and would also link up the new S4C headquarters, when that is eventually built. The cost of the road is supposed to be paid by the various developers, in stages, as the homes are built.

Whether there was, or is, any demand for 1200 new homes on the outskirts of a town the size of Carmarthen is debatable and a controversial issue in itself.

Anyway, in 2015, to get the road going, and with no developer contributions forthcoming at the time, the council decided, in secret session, to borrow most of the £5m to fund the road.

Throughout 2016 there have been numerous council press releases, with suitably hard-hatted and hi-vis wearing officials pictured at the various stages of road building. All went quiet late last year when it emerged that there were wrangles with landowner(s) and compulsory purchase orders were set in motion. Although, given that the development brief has been around for about five years it's a wonder that such issues weren't ironed out years ago. The identity of the landowner is unknown.

The application next week has been submitted by one of the developers to increase the number of houses they can build before the new road is complete from 60 to 150. They have permission for 250 homes out of the 1200.
The landowner/developer, Carmarthen Promotions Ltd, which features landed gentry based in Norfolk, claims that the current agreement is not viable, (their most recent accounts can be seen on the Companies House website) so presumably no developer contribution to the road will be made until 150, rather than 60 of the homes are built, though this is not entirely clear.

The application (here, W/27776) features some technical wizardry which suggests there'll be little or no impact on traffic even if the road is not built. I suspect that residents local to Carmarthen, rather than Norfolk, might disagree.

However, despite the fact that the council has borrowed the £5m, (the Welsh Goverment also provided £1.3m towards it) the application is recommended for approval, and has also been given the nod from Cardiff. Whether any 'developer contributions' to the road ever materialise is clearly in doubt.

Amending S106 agreements or planning conditions due to apparent viability problems is fairly common and was the subject of this interesting Guardian article in 2015. What is not common is for the viability reports to be disclosed, although campaigners in Bristol have had some recent success.

An application by Ffos Las Ltd in 2014 to extend the life of the planning permission for 280 homes included a requested amendment to  change the S106 agreement due to 'viability' issues. My FOI request for a copy of the viability report commissioned by Savils was refused.
That particular application is still, according to the council website, 'under consideration' so I guess the extension of time was granted by default but what became of the S106 agreement remains unknown.

3 comments:

Patricia B said...

Very interesting and at the same time very worrying. When are our council's going to put people before developers. It began with Maggie Thatcher and her plan to sell off council homes in order to build new ones. It was obvious then this wasn't really the plan, and the situation with homelessness,young people living in shop doorways is a direct reflection on our local councils. If our councils continue putting developers profits first allowing this scandal to continue what hope is there for the younger generation and what does it say about the men in suits who we pay our taxes to. It is shocking.

Patricia B said...

Do these developers and their cronies from the council ever walk the streets of Cardiff at night. It is the most depressing and upsetting sight for anyone to witness who possesses an ounce of humanity . Less profit and more humanity is not too much to ask for human beings who have nothing.

Sian Caiach said...

The link road is already underway complete with a set of traffic lights near St David's business park. I wonder if the uncertainty over the S4C project funding contribution from Trinity College will affect their contribution towards the new road?