Transcript

Afternoon, and welcome to DTA Committee. All members are here, I understand some members of the public are still coming in, so they're properly coming and take their seats over the next 10 minutes of that, okay. We just have three brief housekeeping rules. Firstly, if you've got a mobile, please turn it off, we'll put it on silent, please. Secondly, the toilets, if you need them, are either side of the main entrance. Thirdly, no flower alarm is planned, so if that happens, it will be the real thing, in which case, go down the ramp to the right of the entrance and assemble the cathedral piazza, where, you know, that's the correct place to actually meet. Could I say Councillor Humor, Phillipa, it's very good to see you back. I'm glad you've been covered fully from KVL of course. I would just like to address the batting order today. We originally had three very meeting potentially controversial applications. The third one, one, Badness of Greens has been deferred at the applicant's request, so that will come probably in June, I guess. So it means this afternoon should be shorter, but it will still be a fairly demanding meeting. I'm not usual. I've agreed that there will be a 20-minute adjournment between the two items, so when we conclude that this one Baltic Wharf, I'll then invite members to actually have a comfort break or disappear, but please, please come back when you're required, because even if you miss five seconds public for it, I show where you can't doubt or speak on that item. That's fine. I just would like to make a few, a personal pot really. Normally this would be more appropriate under any of the business later on, but I suspect will be fairly tired by then, so I'm saying it now. This is not only the last meeting of the civic year, it's the last meeting of this council term before Wednesday's or next Thursday's elections, so I just wanted to thank members, not only those present, but those who have served on before. For example, Councillor Pierce, Councillor Goggins and Councillor Poudon, for their insightful contributions. I've always, apart from the time I've served on the cabinet, I've always served on DC committees. I have to say personally, I think that it's the most effective, the most interesting committee on the council. In my view, no other committee can, somebody just pose a question or make a point, and it completely changes how you think about an application. So thank you. I've enjoyed chairing this for the last three years, but I could only have done it, with the collective contribution of all members. Could I also thank Simone, her predecessor, Gary Collins, and their hard-working team, because without them, we couldn't be here of course. Lastly, can I just say, I'm aware for some members that will definitely be their last council meeting, Chris Herba and Phillip Opara, who's not here, and also Thomas Stepping down and retiring after deviated service. So again, can I thank you very much, and also wish you the best for the future. We're also losing for different reason Andrew Varney, who subject to the will of the electorate, could well become the next or more, but I hope in due course, he comes back to DC committees. Finally, could I say, I probably know Chris Jackson, more of the most members for longer. He's been a pleasure, Chris. Clearly, unlike me, you've got the needs to actually support a short strike the year, so well done. Thank you very much for that, it's been a pleasure. I have enjoyed this committee. Thank you. So, I'll move on to item two, apologies, Steve. Yeah, pardon Councillor Hussain, substituted by Councillor Rippington. Welcome to Decorations of Interestry. It's not really a declaration of interest, but I made quite trenching comments several years ago about needing or wanting a Bristol City Centre Caravan Park. So, that's on the record. In my view, that was there where we are now. I'm approaching the application for more purely on its merits, so I don't think I have any conflict of interest. Chris? I've got to say, I'm actually a member of the Caravanamilt Room Club, which that is a site. Yep, anyone else? No. So, we're moved onto the minutes of the last meeting, item four. Can I move those? So, it's a true and accurate copy. You cannot have this again. Andrew, thank you. The action chief has just been noting item five, item six appeals. Same, do you want to say anything? No, nothing further to add. I mean, I haven't been informed of any questions around the appeals, so. Totally. Thanks, I just had a question about the proportion of appeals we're getting as a non-determination. How are they stacking up? Are they starting to tail off now, or are things still going in the wrong direction? Without wanting to jinx things, fingers crossed. I think they are maybe starting to tail off, but I think what we are still seeing a high volume of appeals, including more on refuses as well, simply, and I think this is simply a matter of numbers as well, because we've churned out so many more decisions, you know, then proportionately the appeal rate will have gone up as well. But what I'm really pleased about is actually our rate of defending them is actually really holding up well as well, and again, touch would. I don't want to jinx anything, but I'm quite optimistic. Are there any more questions? No. So we moved to enforce an item seven, which one see is notably blank. I'm sure the chief planner knows my attitude. I look forward to seeing it. I don't have a lot of enforcement notices in June. So we moved to item eight, public forum. The practice in this committee is to deal with public forum directly in front of every relevant item. So we're doing with Baltic War first. All 67 applications received submissions have been electronically sent to members for them to read. So the people who've indicated they want to speak and summarize them are about 20 people. I call your names less, I think, 12 for the first item in order. Then if you could indicate where you're sitting, my quality, all of it will bring you. Well, my kit should be switched on, so you don't need to adjust it. Just speak to us. But currently, I urge you to recall we have a full copy of your public statement. So you've only got one minute just to actually summarize that. To my left, there are some traffic lights. So green, obviously, I think after 45 seconds, the amber shows, then red after one minute. So we will deal with the Baltic War One's first. The first person I have is Anne, she was Devara. Anne? A quality war has approved at this meeting. It will be the first time that a development in the highest flood risk zone. Without any means of escape, residents are access for emergency services during the flood has ever been approved in Bristol. This president will seriously undermine flood safety as it will be virtually impossible to refuse permission for any other such dangerous site in future. Members should be reminded that flooding kills more the people worldwide than any former natural disaster. And in this case, flooding will involve very fast moving water travelling up to 20 miles per hour. The flooding that residents would be expected to endure as a hazard rating of danger for all, meaning a risk of death for residents and emergency services. The people of Bristol are relying on this committee to safeguard current and future generations of Bristolians in the face of corporate and political interests. Thank you Anne, that was picture-perfect or time-perfect of course. Gila Tolton. Do you want to protect biodiversity? Do you think trees are important in making our cities liveable? Do you think affordable homes should be genuinely affordable? Do you care about keeping Bristolian safe during extreme flood events? Do you support building on genuine brownfield sites? Do you think children should be provided with adequate play provision? If so, you should not vote for this development. With all of its faults, why is this being pushed through? Botic wolf is a Trojan horse for other high-floodrous carriers. By creating a precedent dismissing the statute through flood protections, the proposal will remove the last barrier to other flood-prone developments such as Western Harbour. To approve this development today, we'll have widespread consequences, jeopardising the safety and well-being of Bristolians for decades to come. Thank you, John. Professor Tolton, please. John, are you there? I think she had two to read out. Oh, sorry. Thank you. The planning officer's report fails to mention nearly 600 objections to this development. This site is not brownfield, according to NPPF definition. The site has nearly a quarter of all herbicide trees. There are very few places to plant the 162 replacement trees. The financial viability report shows there can be no affordable housing without a speculative grant, or the 80% market rent in this area is not affordable. It fails the sequential test, as the nearby SS Great Britain car park is lower flood risk and is available. In fact, Gorham homes have already appointed architects. When flooded, the site is surrounded by deeper water which will deny escape for residents and access for emergency services and the environment agency with truth their flooding objections. Can you bring it to a close, please? Only when the developers agree to help flood their flood defences, which is at least 15 years away. Thank you. Mark Ashton, please. Sorry, I'm a bit confused. I thought your wife was actually presenting yours. No? No, I had two statements as well. Oh, well. Yeah. Sorry about that. Okay. Thank you, Chair. This is our last chance to save this important site with 102 mature trees and nearly 40% tree cover and representing a quarter of all trees on the herbicide. The development would remove 82 mature trees with few, if any, sites for the required 162 replacement trees. Even the policy requires that locations must be identified through the planning process. You should be in no doubt the required replacement trees will not be planted and this is contrary to BCS9 and DM70. Rather than building inappropriate high-rise flats with which few can afford even at 80% market rent, this valuable woodland site could easily be transformed into a park and play area for the benefit of the community enhancing the area as a place to live and visit. This is the sort of vision we would like to see from our Council. On the other hand, if the committee continues to undervalue the environment by disregarding its own policies, central Bristol will be entirely devoid of trees to the detriment of us all. John, do you want to do your second one now? Yeah, I'll do my second one now. Thank you. Okay. Planning policy in relation to flooding requires the development will be safe for its lifetime. Access routes should allow occupants to safely access and exit with vehicular access to allow the emergency services to safely reach the development. The latest flood assessment concedes that access and escape from the development will not be possible for over one and a half hours in itself and law for. However, as the site is entirely surrounded by deeper channels, emergency services will not have access for perhaps hours putting residents and rescue services in mortal danger. This development also fails the sequential test, which states development should not be permitted if there are reasonably available sites in areas of lower risk of flooding. Nearby, the SS Great Britain car park has lower flood risk and is available for development. In fact, it is listed on Gorham's website and they are already appointed architects. Failing both sequential and exception tests to permit this development would be both dangerous and unlawful. Thank you. And more cash time, please. Unfortunately, your chair has rejected our carefully crafted request to postpone this meeting. We have said before you why this application is not ready. We have also offered arguments why procedures today would be in breach of the local government Act 1972, citing both statute and case law and support. The late publication of the park services comments yesterday only serves to reinforce our case that too many issues remain unresolved to you. If the chair will not listen, then we urge the committee to. Please ignore the legacy ambitions of this dying administration. Please set aside our own short-term aspirations for next week's election. The applicant, in effect, this council refuses to comply with this declaration of an ecological emergency and achieve at least 10% biodiversity gain. He agrees instead, only she can comply with the bare minimum required by the MPPF, now superseded, but just better than zero gain. Mark, could you bring it to an ambience? Peter, hi, Rich, please. I look at 37 Westbrook Court, which borders directly onto the caravan site. And for 32 years, I've had a quiet, sunny, secluded garden, and I chose the house for that reason. If this goes ahead, there'll be 80 windows looking straight down on my house and garden. The house and garden will be thrown into shade for most of the day throughout the year. This affects 16 households and 26 in total suffer a loss of light. Now, the council is the developer, the landowner, and the planning authority. And my question is, who's looking at the interests of me in the other 26 householders? Because I feel it's sold down the river. You talk about social housing. This is antisocial housing because it affects people who have lived there. I've been there 32 years. And if this goes ahead, I'm just going to leave Bristol after 40 years of working here. And I've also had that I volunteer for all of board, and I've taken children's sailing and accessing these. This is a difficult sport. Sorry, can I bring it to an end? Well, I think it will cast a windshield. Sorry, everyone's got an end. Sorry, but I'm not going to rehearse. I'm not going to rehearse. Sorry, I'm not going to rehearse. The representative from Grandma Holmes asked at the end of her statement, If not here, where? Perhaps the answer is not to be in flood zone three, not whether it's already an established business, bringing revenue into Bristol, not where an innumerable mature trees will have to be sacrificed, and not in a conservation area destroying the character of this end of the harbour, or going against the council's own policies. One whiff of affordable hopes and the committee will feel obliged to give permission, but the red law report makes it clear this scheme is barely viable, even at 100% private sales. Where is the evidence that grant funding will be available? The Environment Agency has only withdrawn its objection because contribution to the flood strategy is promised. Where is this money coming from and how much will it be? This application should not be brought to committee in the dying days of the current administration, as it is such a blatantly political move, to set precedence to ensure the future of the western harbor vanity project. Steve and Wickham. Steve and Wickham. Thank you. We've got the pretty pictures of the water in flood. In three years of asking, Griffith have rebuilt the river wall, and the Gorham Holmes team have still failed to produce a TVIA of their proposal from the southern iconic viewpoints, P28 and P29, just 100 metres away across the river to the south. They've produced a wide angle or in-accurate CGI for your private briefing yesterday. At up to 10 metres above the lamppost on Cumberland Road, it now seems fair to assume that they were afraid of it, ashamed of it, or really didn't care what the public thought about their proposals. Paragraph 11d1 of the MPPF is quite clear the presumption in favour does not apply when the application of policies in this framework that protect areas or assets of particular importance provides a clear reason for refusing the development proposed, and those areas and assets include designated heritage assets and conservation areas. On balance, the panel considers that in this current form and as a result of it, in idic or adequate assessment of all views the proposal does not meet the relevant heritage policy test contained in the local plan and the MPPF. It does not generate sufficient public benefits that outweigh the significant harm that it will cause and therefore this application cannot be supported. Gotta be you slowly. Gotta be you slowly. The report is a mixture of untruth and selective quoting of policies positive to the application. All the policies disallow and this development are ignored. There are no identified sites for the required 162 tree replacements. This is not a brownfield site. It is not and has never been occupied by a permanent structure which the MPPF definition demands. The developer admits there won't be any safe flood escape route for residents or access for emergency services for at least a decade. The promise of funding for BAFS is nothing other than a bribe to the Environment Agency who are partners in the project. The development is not financially viable with the promised affordable housing which at 80% market rent and one of Bristol's most expensive areas is not affordable anyway for the majority of people. How much precious life will be endangered or destroyed for this development to go ahead? Cristina Macario. As development director at the council's own housing company Gorham Homes, it's my job to transform council land into the new homes so desperately needed in RCT. On any given night around 3,000 people are homeless, many in temporary accommodation. We must provide high-quality homes in central Bristol that will house people for generations to come. Baltic Wharf has been a carbon park from visitors to RCT. It could become home to hundreds of historians. While not without its challenges, we've worked tirelessly on this development to make it the best it can be to create high-quality sustainable homes and new public spaces on this part of the waterfront for the first time in decades. The development is safe and the Environment Agency has removed this objection. We've kept as many trees as we can while making space for much needed new homes. We'll plant 220 new trees too. 40% of the homes will be affordable, 50 of which the lowest form of council rent with grant funding 100% could be council homes for social rent and shared ownership. Thanks to everyone who has not, who has gotten involved in this scheme, who has challenged it and helped us make it better. These decisions aren't always easy but I ask you this, if not here, where? Glenn Martin. Glenn Martin. Good afternoon members. I work for the Elgorm's development partner for this project. We're a family owned busboat house builder. While it's relatively new to Bristol, we're actively involved in bringing forward over 700 homes for the city. We work well over half of these for affordable tenure. In doing so, we provide not just high-quality homes with custodians but jobs, support for local supply chains and broader social value. This application is part of this and is in the highly sustainable location, well connected to local and minty youth employment and travel connections. It will provide increased connectivity to the waterfront, the creation of dedicated cultural space with new public access to Cumberland Road by a high quality landscape new space, allowing residents of Bristol to continue to enjoy this herbicide setting. The design is moderate and appropriate in scale, achieving local plant densities and a spacious, tenured blind designed to a high quality and offer accessibility for adapting needs. They remain safe from flooding and powered by low carbon technology made ready for Bristol's expanding heat network. The significant challenge has been the loss of trees and the consequence of biodiversity, which is really gratable. However, retention options have been fully explored, particularly on the eastern boundary and supplemented with additional screening. Mitigation measures are comprehensive and commitment is known to reach a positive biodiversity position. It's a fantastic opportunity. I'm bringing you to close, please, thank you. To deliver, not just much needed homes but also the opportunity for businesses, culture engagement and new public space for Bristol. Councillor Macalester. Thank you Chair. I brought up a number of issues in my written statement but right now I'd just like to focus on one key aspect of this application. I do welcome the prospect of many new affordable homes Bristol deserves the high quality affordable development this could bring but a lot of this application's appropriateness and acceptability hinges on planning conditions and that be that from trees to flood defences to construction times and crucially the affordable element of housing to an extent. Bristol Council, unfortunately, has a very poor history of enforcing planning conditions, especially against itself. Members will be aware of the long-running saga of the Metrobus conditions which have left residents of Avon Crescent close to the Baltic Wharf site in limbo for a decade. If the committee cannot be confident that planning conditions relating to this application are solid then I urge the members to refer the application back to review trust in the Council and the need for affordable and safe housing that can be depended upon depends upon us getting this right. Thank you. Martin runs Martin. Thank you very much. Yes, I'm just going to basically say what Patrick said. Some of the members were here 10 years ago for the Metrobus consent and there was some conditions attached to that which have never been met and the Council has ever since refused to enforce them. One of the great selling points we were promised with Metrobus was we were going to have flood of defences which was supposed to be part of it down Cumberland Road. They were supposed to be built all the way down to the Foxhall Bridge. They were never built. So I think this scheme is safe if the flood defences are built too sweet but they won't be and the Council won't enforce when they're not. Can I thank you for that? What, as I said, copies of every submission were circulated to members before. I would also say to be honest it was at least one comment which I would say in my view was unsubstantially to uneven libraries and Lisa I welcome the fact from this bay in fact sorry next month. Standing orders will change and in fact there will be two days after receipt of committee papers or certainly public forum before they're published and that will allow officers to actually have the time to look more carefully through. Obviously I don't wish to actually censor people but I do think it's important we're not liveless. Could I move to Jim at the case officer? This is Jim's first gauge actually presenting to committee so welcome and met the members aren't too bad they're the Chairman's bit of a tartar of course. I think exceptionally giving you 10 minutes in Jim at present hopefully that extra time will allow some time to actually inform members perhaps their questions. Jim. Thank you. There's just a few technical issues. What's on my screen is not showing what is up there. Let's try again. I haven't started. There we go. Sorry about that. So thank you chair. Afternoon members. Firstly I refer you to the which provides the latest ecology comments. You'll note they are of no objections and suggest conditions. There's also some updated transport conditions there. There's also been four further objections and further objections from the Bristol tree forum since the officers report. However the officers recommendation hasn't changed from the report. This application is for the site on Baltic Wharf caravan site. The site is on Spike Island to the north of Cumberland road and the river Avon and to the south of the floating harbour. To the east is existing residential and to the west is the saving club and boat yard. The existing site is 0.8 hectares that is currently occupied by a caravan park which consists mainly of hard standing, gravel with some grass areas, toilet block, wardens accommodation and parking. There are a large number of trees on the existing site. The application is for the erection of 166 residential properties and 555 square metres of commercial space on the lower and upper ground floor levels to the north facing out towards the floating harbour. The commercial uses could include arts workspace, cafes, restaurants etc. The site is mainly in flood zone three with a small part of the south western side in flood zone two. The site lies within the city docks conservation area. The units will be over six blocks across the site ranging from three to six stories. The height of the blocks are lower towards the boundaries of the site with the tallest block of six stories in the centre of the site. Block F to reduce the visual impact. The units adjacent to Cumberland road and to the eastern side will be lower with a flat roof to reduce bulk and massing. In regards to the affordable housing provision 66 dwellings will be affordable equating to 40% which is the policy requirement for the area. 50 of these will be for social rent and 16 for shared ownership. There will be a mix of 71 beds, 82 two beds and 14 three bedroom properties across the site for both open market and affordable housing. The density of the site is 193 dwellings per hectare. The urban living SPD states the optimum density would be approximately 200 dwellings per hectare. The scheme has been subject to an independent design review panel and city design panel. Car parking and cycle parking will be provided via ramp access to lower ground floor level from the southern side of the site with a vehicle access from Cumberland road. The remaining site will be vehicle free. 74 car parking spaces which will include six fully accessible spaces will be provided on the lower ground floor with 20% of these active car charging points. A car club space will be provided within the vicinity of the site with membership provided to all residents of the site. There will be 310 cycle spaces provided. The site is considered to be a low car development. A restriction on resident parking permits for future residents of the site will prevent parking over spill onto the adjacent roads. Delivery bays will be provided at the entrance of the development with electric trolleys to help move equipment deliveries to the commercial units. There is a mixture of public and private amenity space provided across the site. All homes will have private amenity spaces either through gardens terraces or balconies along with play areas on the podium garden area and other play equipment around the site. Whilst these play areas away from the public area they are accessible for all residents. There will be a new permissive public path running through the site centre the site that will allow the public to walk from Cumberland road through to floating harbour. The historic stone wall on the southern edge will be maintained however the existing entrance will be widened to provide suitable vehicle access. There will be the removal of the existing brick infill in the wall to provide additional access route to the site. The following slides provide some visuals of the proposed units. This slide shows the proposal from the northern side looking back towards the harbour. The commercial units would be located on the ground floor areas at the two blocks A and B that front the harbour with the site rising 2.6 metres up from the keyside wall into the development. The top visual is looking towards the site from the south Cumberland road side the bottom is looking towards the site from the west. This visual shows the proposal looking from the east and the adjacent residential units. This plan shows a cross-section of the site with the adjacent houses. The distance between the blocks and the existing residential is between 18 to 21 metres which are acceptable distances between dwellings. In order to further protect the residential meanity of the existing residents to the east the design is incorporated screening panels on the balconies used like smaller windows and raised window sill heights. In addition the majority of the existing trees along the eastern boundary will remain. The next few slides show some of the floor plans of the units. This is the lower ground floor which shows the layout of the underground car parking, cycle parking and plant rooms. To the north you can see the one commercial unit. This slide shows the upper ground floor level which shows the commercial units on the northern side of blocks A and B. In the remainder blocks further back from the harbour is a mix of 1, 2 and 3 bedroom units. At this level is also the public walkway through the centre of the site and a large part of the landscaping. This is the first floor floor plan which shows that there is a mix of 1, 2 and 3 bedroom units across the site. I won't show you all that every single floor plan, the range of the floor plans is fairly similar in layout and units. This plan shows the cross section of buildings A and part of F, the centre unit. As can be seen the car park is on the lower ground floor commercial units at the front of unit A with the residential units above. The podium guardings are set at the upper ground floor adjacent to unit F. A very similar cross sectional diagram showing units B, C and D along the eastern side of the site. Again car parking and cycle stall on the lower ground floor commercial units to the front of the block B and residential above. This application has been in for a period of three years and over this period there have been approximately 400 objections raised. The key issues that have been raised include the loss of trees from the site, flood risk, impact upon the character of the area, scale and height of the scheme, insufficient parking on site, loss of light and overshadowing, impact of winds on water sports on the harbour and we now cover some of these key issues raised. In regards to the heritage impact the site is adjacent to the locally listed building of the cottage public house and within the setting of a number of grade two and grade two star listed buildings within the wider area including under four yard, bond warehouses and a voxel bridge. Both city design group and historic England have stated that the scheme will have an impact upon the setting of listed buildings in the immediate context but the degree of harm is just to be less than substantial. The site lies within flood zone 3A. The LLFA have no objections based on the additional report submitted which shows that there will be a safe access and egress route to and from the site and it has been accepted that the risk from flooding on the site is unlikely until 2070 by which time the LLFA are confident that the Bristol and Avon flood strategy will be completed. The Environment Agency have also withdrawn their objection to the proposal subject to conditions and the proposal will meet both the existing policy and emerging local plan policy. It is considered to have met both the sequential test and the exception test. The Environment Agency acknowledge the mitigation that is proposed for the site including raising the residential finish floor level to above the design flood level only locating less vulnerable uses on the ground floor level providing both internal and external egress routes to raise ground providing its sternal doorways from the upper ground floor level to raise ground and the road and demonstrating safe access until the bus is built. It is acknowledged that a large number of trees will be lost from the site 82 in total. It is proposed for 68 new trees to be planted on the site. These will be approximately 4.5 metres to 5 metres tall and will include cherry, older, hornbeam and white beam. The existing trees along the eastern boundary will remain. In accordance with the Bristol tree replacement policy a further 160 trees will be required to be planted off site. It is envisaged that 10 trees will be planted along the key site path and Cumberland Road but further investigation will be required by parts development to ensure these are suitable locations in regards to underground services. The final locations of the replacement trees will be determined as part of the section 106 agreement in agreement with the Bristol Parks Development team. In regards to biodiversity net gain on the site as the application was submitted three years ago the 10% net gain does not apply to this site however an overall net gain should be identified. The site will be providing green biodiverse routes, additional native hedge and trees for planting, rain garden species rich grass lawns. The applicants have submitted updated BNG metrics as national guidance has changed and have now used the statutory metric. The latest metric results in the net gain of 27% for hedgerows and a loss of minus 7.86 of habitats overall. Equating to half a BNG unit that will be needed to be mitigated within the section 106. The next few slides are just some photo montages of pre and post development. The first is looking from the northeast down towards the southwest towards the harbour and the site. This one is looking towards the site from voxel bridge. This is looking across the water in the harbour towards the south towards the site and the sailing club. In conclusion officers consider the planning balance that the benefits of the scheme outweigh the harm. There are no technical nor statutory objections to the scheme and therefore it is officer's recommendation to grant approval subject to the recommended conditions and upon completion of the section 106. Thank you Chair. Thank you John. I'm taught by the DSA with your bang on for your presentation so well done. I'm sure that you plan and advise the colleagues that they are who are me like a caner. Could I first invite the rep from legal services who I believe will risk my request to the statement by the pre-forum. In what respect did you want me to respond? I think it's the confirmation that the act that's been quoted as not being complied with has actually been complied with as I've been as I've advised several times before. Apologies. Yes so section 100 be the local government act that's referred to. It refers to reports and in this instant relates to the officer's report and as long as there's no material changes then the deadline has been complied with. Councillor Jackson. Thank you very much and thank you for your first presentation it was excellent. Could I just make clear? I haven't started general questions. Oh sorry. I'm assuming it's to the legal. No. Is there any questions on that? In that case sorry. Could I also say thank you though that Jim Cliff is kind came up from his dungeon down beneath our planning obligations officer. Jim do you want to address any items now or would you prefer to leave it to member questions? Good afternoon Councillor ADY. No I'm really here to pick up any questions that might arise. I have nothing to say unless asked. Right in that case would move on to member questions. Jim uh um can I just although it doesn't feature in the tree for an statement um I can understand where they're coming from with their frustration back although planning applications may meet the present Bristol tree standard a large number or site for example 112 here and all too often we don't appear as scheduled to being very speedy and identifying replacement sites. Is there any way we could inject into the conditions some urgency or as I suspect the answer is because in my view this administration has not been as should we say hot on this issue as they could have been it may require a future administration that it acted next Thursday. Thank you Chair. Um I'm sorry I don't I don't know about the sort of the past history of the delivery of the tree sites but I do know from talking to parks development that they are looking for locations for these trees whilst we're developing the section 106 so I'm hoping that that will help speed up the process. Okay thanks Chris. You've apparently answered one of my questions and again thank you for your uh presentation and obviously there's some negatives for this one thing if you just maybe enhance for me please the flooding because the environment did have an objection in a wall back I believe is that correct we're an agency but now that's been removed can you just give a bit more information? I am talking into them. Should we not have a debate but that's a helpful point um if we can try to address the microfane please. Okay yeah because obviously that objection has been removed can you just give me a bit more clarity on that decision please and why? Yeah certainly catch the direction so um originally the environment agency did have injections there have been a consider I think it's like 14 reiterations of the flood risk assessment um the applicants have taken on board all the comments raised by the environment agency and have provided a lot of mitigation within their reports and it is acknowledged that the vulnerable uses the residential are above the design flood zone and the basement levels then will be allowed to flood which is just where the car parking and the plant rooms are. Thank you and let's clarify that for me and just moving on from the chairs thing about the trees we had a briefing and I'm just wondering especially with parks is everything possible going to be done to try to replace some trees within that smaller area I know that they're looking at places around not right on that site but is there is can we make sure that every possible opportunity if this does get passed that they try to fit as many in in that area less possible is that can we add that to the um restrictions or things that needs to be done? Certainly I know they try to fit as many within the one mile radius as they can so it's certainly something we can look into encouraging further. Be one of the restrictions if it gets passed that there has to be done. Possible to put on there. We can certainly put that in as well but the just to be aware in addition as well there is from a B&G point of view from a biodiversity net gain it is in the applicant's interest who and there is a hierarchy within that anyway to replace as close as possible. Okay thank you. That's fine thank you. Fee. A question probably for Steve or maybe for legal advisor. We've been invited by some of the commentators here to defer this application because of the concerns about insufficient information on some aspects. What would the process be for that please? Is that one for you Steve or is it a legal one? How do we do that? It should we want to or should we want to test the will of the thank you. I would say of the of the slide took it advice for officers about this. Clearly as we've heard from legal actually the primary legislation and the council's commitments about openness and actually considering information have not been breached. That said vice that's what I was reacting. It will be for the committee in my view in debate just to actually to flash out whether they think there's sufficient information to make determination today. If they do, that's or is yet a refuse or a proof. If they think not the I'm I will clearly test the mood of the house if the support for actually deferral. That would be appropriate. Just to check because I've seen the correspondence flying to soon forth and you clearly have the opinion that should the deferral be appropriate it's for us to decide in this room and you're saying that this should occur during the debate phase of the meeting. Thank you. That's a clarity I wanted. I do have a question as well. It seems to be the case that I think it's a tree forum was saying because this development is taking place on council land then we need to identify the areas for the replacement trees because it is council land rather an external developer. Can you and there's this information that only arrived this morning. Forgive me, I was in a taxi forum all this morning so I haven't been able to read properly. Thank you. Here we are. Okay. The tree replacement apparently we do need detailed location for replacement trees because it is our land. It's an hard standing. Thank you. Could you comment on that please. I think that's something it probably needs clarifying. That has regretted being quite a lot of information thrown our way quite late in the day actually on various elements so forgive me for not completely verse but I think it's something we do need to look at. Thank you. In regards to the whistle tree replacement policy there is no distinction between council land and privately owned land. I don't believe that it to be provided so there should be no need to. Have you got further details there. I can refer to page 20 of the well sorry I'm reading from the information we have sent this morning. Page 20 of the BTRS planning obligations SPD where it says that if a tree is in a hard time. 20 cell phone. Hang on. I'm sorry. I'll give you a try. Paul is amplifying on my point. I just want to to get clarification because this is the information that we've been sent as you said very late and what the information the assertion here from from members of the public is that on page 20 it says that if you have a tree if it's on council land and you have a tree in hard standing before the approval can be given you have to identify the replacement hard stack. Where exactly you're going to put those tree trees I don't know whether that's true or not but it's something I think that we do need to bottom out because I don't want to be in a situation where we're told afterwards that we made decisions without having enough information. I don't know that I did. Thank you. I mean the SPD is is a consideration but it's not policy it's guidance. What I would also say is that the conservation officer has looked our ecology officer I should rather say natural conservation officer has looked at the commons again and has confirmed that that she's content that everything that needs to be complied with has been complied with and that the conditions are covering everything that needs to be covered. Tom. Thank you. I apologize for banging on about trees but I think it is quite an important aspect of this application. Could you just outline for me really clearly how many trees it is that will need to be planted off site and how many of those you mentioned there was conversations ongoing about finding sites. So then how many sites have been found so far and how many are we still waiting for and am I correct in thinking that the S106 will be you have to have a site allocated for all of those before we can sign that condition off or is it just as many as we can and then X percent will be left over at the end. My second question sorry was just about the flooding again because that's the other big thing for me is about the safety and I'd really like you to take us all through the timeline really clearly about what's happened with the Environment Agency and what it is specifically that made them lift their objection because the concern they initially had was that there was no access or egress for people in the event of a flood. Are they now saying that that's no longer the case and that's why they've lifted their objection but if you could just be really clear on that that would be really helpful for me. Thank you. So in regards to the tree numbers I think it was the original question there. So there'll be planting of 68 new trees on the site itself and then there'll be a further 162 trees planted outside. It's anticipated that 10 of these would be on the past side by the harbour front floating harbour and on Cumberland Road. With parts development they are currently mapping locations for these trees and they're looking to have that undertaking ready for the section 106 agreements. Does that answer all that first question? Apologies if I've missed a bit of that. So of those 160 so there's currently none that have already been allocated for where sites have been allocated or? They've identified about 40 sites so far but it's ongoing work and it obviously takes us a fair bit of time so they said it'd be over the next few weeks while they're developing the section 106 they'll be able to provide a full mapping of all the trees. A full mapping okay. I think they've also in addition to that sort of identified how many of those can be in soft standing and how many in heart standing because that's the key difference because clearly in heart standing is a lot more expensive and basically the majority is identified for heart standing and therefore a lot more costly. Thanks so much. I've got a couple of questions arising from the public for them. Sorry I do apologize it was my fault time. Okay so if I remember rightly it was regarding the environment agency and the objections and the alterations so throughout the process they have had various concerns raised. With the access and the exit from the site the LLFA have stated they had no objections rather than the environment agency they said that the LLFA would be the best person for commenting on that one. In regards to that the access is safe up until 2070 beyond which then the access would be potentially flooded for up to an hour however with the baths coming forward with certainty that that should be in place by 2070 and therefore it gives lifetime safety for the residents on the site and it's due to this lifetime fruit like protection that's why EA who removed their objection. Right fellow boss. Thank you as I said a couple of questions just arising from public for them. One is to do with the views and I'm never quite sure about whether views are a material planning consideration which I don't think they are but is it's do views become material if it's part of the heritage assets is that correct? Yeah that's correct basically so you don't have like a personal view as your material consideration but if it's part of a heritage asset or like conservation area then yes it would be considered as part of a material consideration. Then my other question was just to do with the overshadowing and the distance between buildings and the is the closest distance would be 18 metres. That's correct yeah the closest distance on that eastern edge. Okay thank you and that's within the standards that we have. Yeah okay thank you Andrew [Music] Hello is that better? I thought it didn't sound quite right thank you. So yeah I've got a question similar to Councillor Hume's actually about overlooking a gentleman mentioned in public form that his gardens are about to be overlooked by 80 windows and I just wanted to clarify that this scheme is definitely policy compliant in terms of overlooking and overshadowing and distance of windows from neighbouring properties. I mean I have to say you know to have a garden in a city centre location I have no overlooking whatsoever is is a rare luxury but we need to make sure that the scheme is policy compliant and also what mitigations we can put in place to minimize overlooking. Thank you. Yeah I can confirm that it is policy compliant and as stated before we got the distances there of between 18 to 21 metres along that eastern edge with the existing residents. In terms of mitigation, balconies have had screening put on them to prevent the overlooking. Windows have been like small windows along the eastern side so they're not such large windows there and they have raised sill heights as well so it's more difficult for people to be looking out standing there looking out over to there. Andrew. Yeah just a second question about the seal contributions. So I think it said in the planning obligations package that seal funding it would attract 1.7 million residential rocks and 140 000 for commercial. Would that seal contribution change if the amount of affordable housing, social housing in the development changes if it becomes 100% affordable? That'll be one for me. Yes so any social housing is eligible for 100% relief from seal so the the figure I think at the moment was about 1.7 million for the residential element that will reduce that's assuming an open market development because that's how it's calculated until any relief is claimed. So if we assume that the development will provide 40% affordable housing which is what it's saying it's going to do and it's being determined on that basis then I would anticipate that the seal will be about about a million pounds 40% of 1.7 million obviously if the whole lot becomes affordable housing which could happen on any development you know if it depending on what happens in the future with it then the seal could be down to to nil for the residential that is something that we cannot control other yourselves as a planning committee or myself as the seal officer. It's just what the regulations say but as it stands at the moment I would anticipate that at 40% affordable housing the residential seal will be about a million pounds. Councillor Varney. Paula. Thank you I sort of have three questions if that's okay the first one is you know it says in the report that a contribution will be made to the flooding the BAFS can we ask how much that is the sum. Second question is if there is if it if it does translate into being a hundred percent proposal for a hundred percent affordable at the briefing yesterday there was mention of the fact that you know sort of all the interiors perhaps would have to be reconfigured or there would have to be some changes. How would that actually do? I mean I remember from something previously in my ward where there were amendments being made to a proposal and we got to a certain trigger point you know you could have I think it was like an S-72 or something you could list a whole load of changes or else then at some point it would have to trigger a whole new planning so could you tell us a little bit about what the changes could be and my third question then is about the BNG so bear with me on this one. I was yesterday I sit on the dance as well and yesterday I met with the education officer of the dance and conversation drifted on we were talking about this and we talked we talked about the whole biodiversity net gain thing and loss and obviously it's a huge concern to me that there is no biodiversity net gain on this proposal and we were talking about how that could be achieved and the whole the whole bit about the trees and problems and the education officer said well you know somewhere on the dance like somewhere like the goat the goat gully you could massively increase the biodiversity of a special site within Bristol because I know that there's a lot of a lot of the concern is about the fact that we'll just sell off the biodiversity net gain and go outside Bristol so I'm really keen to try to keep that within Bristol so would it be possible for you know for something you know very innovative and good to be done like that so that we could look at our sites here so something like the goat gully or something else on the dance where you could restore really fantastic grasslands and species and use the money from this site to do that and could we have that as a condition? Thank you very much so the the Basque contribution so we have a commitment from the applicants that they will provide a Basque contribution however that is still to be determined as part of it won't form part of the section 106 it will be a separate contribution but it will be it be formalised that way so I can't give you an exact figure at the moment because we're still working through that at the moment in regards to alterations you're right is section 73 would be a new application if amendments and changes so to the everything's like numbers number bedrooms so altering the mix etc the design all of that would come under a section 73 and it's essentially a whole new planning application that you would be looking at and I'll pass to Simone for BNG. Yes so and just to clarify it's not that there is no BNG already like Gemma has already explained there is already significant hetero positive BNGs on the habitat side where we're looking at additional offside requirements like I explained earlier it's within the setup of BNG already that it favours within the local authority solutions it's within the BNG hierarchy built in in addition to that our parks colleagues again have already been doing a lot of work in that space too because it is something that we are very keen on as an authority as well to make sure that BNG is possibly possibly provided within within Bristol and as close as possible to to the places where the loss is occurring. Could I just add as I'm sure you're aware for the last 12 years planned policing Bristol's been agreed by the mayoral administration obviously from next Wednesday were back to committee rule so it will be actually the capsule capsule as to look at the policy of course in those things but we have to determine this based on current policy so I've got Tim thank you chair I want to ask a question about comments from the strategic housing in the report there are a couple of comments one it would be useful to discuss with the applicant about whether the current m4 units are fully accessible and also early consultation is recommended to minimise high service charge costs I'm just wondering whether either of those are things that can be made conditions of the application or whether these have the conversations have already taken place or whether they will take place you know at what point they might take place thank you yeah they're ongoing conversations however there is what they require was the letings plan which provides all these extra details and that's a part of the forms part the conditions of this planning application so it will form part of the letings plan that they will then agree as part of the condition and a second question sorry just under the objections I noticed there was one objection about whether or not properties would be able to get home insurance because of the flood risk I didn't know if you could address that yeah I certainly can so there are a number of houses already in the area that can receive insurance there given that the residence units are above the flood playing level that it shouldn't stop or prevent any flood insurance for the houses John thank you chairman and thank you for the report um two questions if I may just to go back to trees again it wasn't completely clear for me if this development can go ahead without the alternative sites being identified I know you kind of said that they're going to be working on over the next couple of weeks whilst the S when the sick is done but it wasn't explicitly clear that it's a condition of this application that all of those other 162 trees have to have locations before this can go ahead that was the first question so um the determination of the application it is not considered that every single location of those trees will need to be determined prior to the determination it will be as part of the section 106 for this application that will provide the details of the location and the mapping of each of those trees as I'm sure you've lived John no planned consent is complete by the determination by this committee it only becomes substantive once the section 106 of that's required is complete and so the section 106 has to include the locations of all the trees and the application can't go ahead until the section when it's right so that's that's clarity thank you and the second thing was just a point that was made that this isn't a brain field site can you comment on that and I noticed you didn't use the word brain field either so is it a brain field site yes it is considered a brain field site yet and there are buildings on site but it was also formally a timber yard prior to becoming a caravan park so it is considered a brain field site Tom thank you you've answered a couple of questions I had um my one was about the affordable element and there was a claim made about the the viability of the the scheme and the effect that that might have on it coming forward and and the amount of affordable it can provide um how cast iron is that 40% and if funding is being sought for turning it into 100% affordable Paula mentioned about um you know that there could be the need for a new planning application is that your sort of take on it if for example if we had the 40% and then they did get the grant funding is it likely that another application would have to come forward to facilitate that scheme moving to 100% sure I'd pick that one up I'm taking the last part of your question first council halfway it's almost it sounds a bit mean to say so but it's actually outside of the planning system and what we're determining at the moment the planning system as far as affordable housing is concerned is only concerned with whether a planning policy compliant level of affordable housing can be provided and under the council's policies that maximum amount that is provided through the planning system is 40% so if at some future point in time the developer wants to provide more than that 40% um and they and in order to do that they needed to reconfigure or do something else then they would need to submit a section 73 planning application or a whole new application but that is sounds or it's neither here nor there and in fact as far as as this committee is concerned in determining determining this application going backwards to the first part of your question about viability it's quite an odd circumstance to this one I spent my life looking at viability appraises where people are claiming they can afford no affordable housing and then I come here and give you grim news and you always dread seeing me at these these things this one there's a viability appraisal and viability reports been submitted yet the applicant has said they are providing 40% affordable housing with nil subsidy through the planning system so how they do that through you know the land owner or taking a reduced land value or the developer making a lower profit or what have you is actually their business we don't really care and it sounds a little bit flippant but that's the long and short of it they are offering 40% in a policy compliant set of proportions so um 75% of that 40% would be shared or would be social rent which is rent only 50% of open market value and the rest of it would be shared ownership which is where the housing association ends up proportion and the person who owns the other proportion so that that is absolutely in accordance with our housing enabling strategy and what we what we need the cities need so they said they're providing that 40% affordable housing and that's absolutely fine um planning practice guidance clarifies that there is not a mechanism in place to allow developers to come back in and seek to have that level reduced because the granting of planning permission crystallizes a development risk there's nothing that could stop our future developer putting in a new application you can't stop that but they can't come back in and seek to renegotiate that figure down so they are offering 40% in a proportion that the council wants the fact their viability says they don't think they can afford it is almost neither here nor there they offer is there it is policy compliant P two points one one just picking up what you're saying to him um the definition of affordable housing that's something that lies outside of our scope isn't it it is what it is it's a sort of nationally agreed term because I know there's been queries about what it's not really affordable because it's x but that's not something we can really go behind is it there are affordable there are a number of things that are affordable housing and we don't my point being we don't define it do we we don't define it but this particular application is is setting out the type of affordable that will be provided which is social rental shared ownership which are the types of affordable housing that the city needs most of all so it's not first homes and it's not it's called affordable rent which is rented 80% of open market rather sorry open market in terms of our policy requirements affordable housing is affordable housing and we can't say it's the wrong kind of affordable housing it does these is what i want to say that's correct but this is the right this is the right type of affordable housing as far as our affordable housing and I have a second question going back to the trees um i'm reassured by the clarification that john obtained that in order to get start building they need to fulfill the section one of six agreements which means finding locations for the replacement trees which is a good thing however heavenful fenned um who enforces the enforcer should go around homes or the council not fulfill their own conditions because i think there's probably a certain amount of not well i was going to say cynicism they're too harsh too hard but there is there is a there is a okay there's a certain amount of cynicism about the council's ability to prosecute itself as well especially when it comes to tree because obviously enforcement around tree issues has been low on the agenda i mean we've got very very constrained very tight constraints our enforcement capability anyway so we're heaven for fenned the council not to fulfill its own obligations around tree replacement who would enforce it it is still our planning enforcement team and i assure you they will also enforce it and clearly it will also depend you know any new administration can also say how much of a priority to to give it it what i would also add is that clearly we are in a much better place now than for instance when i started when i started there were zero tree offices in post we now have two tree offices back in post they've caught up on backlogs and we're taking it very seriously could i also add um i don't know like fully understand fee where you're coming from because i agree with the record historically hasn't been great but after next thursday the on the on let's organization which is go on homes will have council reps from the new uh um from the new committee rule uh so it's very much we will be the certain errors directors or someone well to actually influence from internally go on homes so which is more than we have ever applied the sector applicant of goals so i pour just i wanted to just go back to jim about the affordable rents because you said if i and i just want clarification of this you said that um the rent would be 50 percent of the market rate and somebody from the public gallery corrected you and said 80 percent can we just have a clarification on that please you can 50 percent so social rent social rent is rent that is set at it might be a couple of percentage points either side but as in my my experience it's always maybe a couple of percentage points above or below but it's basically 50 percent that is what social rented affordable accommodation is there is a different type of affordable accommodation called affordable rent where the rent can be up to 80 percent but what we're securing through section 106 agreement is social rent which will be at about 50 percent of open market value yeah it's important to make that point and how many how many homes will be at that rate? 50 so 50 out of 166 will be at social rent and 16 would be at shared ownership. Tottenham did all i see your hand no in that case can i suggest we move to the debate of course this application's been extant for about over three years which is quite some time even allowing for the backlog of course and clearly there were substantial issues such as the flooding risk which needed to be bottomed out at the time as i've already mentioned i was publicly quite stringent by the existing caravan park near the docks and you know it was good that a city in my view right Bristol had that and i didn't particularly want to actually the caravan park has happened having said that that's history we are where we are we have to consider this application from Gorham homes here and now um to me always the issue was actually the flooding risk no puns intended if the environment agency maintained their objection i believe that would think this scheme they haven't they actually believe that there are written ways of controlling the risk and they've actually lifted their objection and we've also seen significant physical works proposed by the applicant which will minimize the risk of goals as well as significant contributions to the flooding strategy of course um that makes it a different whole game as far as i'm concerned we then have a proposal for 166 homes at least 40 percent affordable possibly 100 percent and now that's something which every party represented here i'm sure we'd give our i'd teach to see more of and that is powerful to me i've looked at the scheme both in urban design teams it's opening up but to a cross bike island from the ducts from to the new cut and it's positive of course and i believe it's a sort of scheme with the bng gain of almost 30 percent which one you should support actually i believe it should go ahead um i don't know whether it's more of an advice that but chris i jumped since point about if possible not maybe advised parts or if they could actually seek to actually create more replace more trees within a hundred sorry one more radius of the site would be more convincing to me but i will be supporting this application chris thank you chair yeah obviously with planning application none of them are perfect and need resist one but um there's some negative stuff i'm two of the points Richard raised i'm very happy i was going to ask about obviously the the flooding that's the environment that that has turned uh made a big difference um there's a lot of gains to this and and the fact that we're going to get 66 affordable houses in that area is amazing i mean i would like to see a hundred percent if we can but uh but but that's a real positive to that site we're opening up the site i was like i said oh you've used that site in my caravan before but uh that's obviously gone and looked Richard said we've never used it and make this decision on where we are um it was a brownfield site um so that's well within our policy um there's commercial units there you're going to open it up it's going to be more accessible to people um there's more open space i was pleased to see the car clip thing in there because that's always a good thing uh and i do quite like the design although that's not uh some as a planning thing but i it does look quite nice so uh for me the positive is greatly only way the negatives and i will be supporting this application tom thank you and uh thank you for the report i think we often see it this committee sites come forward which developers describe as as difficult and so it tends to be a bit of an excuse to cram as many homes in as they can as high as they can but uh which reflects well on their block bottom line but it's clear that that's not the case here um i think it's taking quite a long time to resolve the issues around flooding and it's obviously a bit lamentable that it's been probably through this close to an election but i i hear that those safety concerns have been addressed and that was a major blown of contention for me um the other bone of contention was however the mature trees the loss of the trees and um the biodiversity net gain and for a flagship site of the council's own developer i think uh you know it's a shame they haven't been able to be an exemplar here um i think it really underlines the importance of uh starting with those aspects and uh working around them however on balance i think that the the secured affordable house in here in an area that would otherwise be totally inaccessible for for those that are most in need and that reassurance that that figure can only go higher along with as you've said about the S106 requirement to find sites for those trees um those outweigh the negatives for me and i am in the support of it Andrew? Yeah thank you very much chairman i found myself in agreement with the yourself and the two previous speakers i think the scheme has proved to be very controversial and i think that's a pity really because i think in many ways it's quite an exemplary scheme you know it is a highly sustainable development in a highly sustainable location obviously there were a couple of big issues for me the flooding which we've we've heard has been addressed and also the loss of mature trees which is very regrettable but you know i think it's rather more regrettable that we have a housing weightiness of 21 000 people so for me that's the key issue we are providing much needed homes for Bristolians and so i will be supporting this application thank you John yeah i actually really like the scheme and i'm reassured by the section 106 and the the trees because that was really the big one for me the only niggling thing i do have is over the enforcement of the conditions because we've seen the council try and prosecute itself in the courts recently which didn't go too well but on balance i'll be supporting the application

• jib - thank you jib - yeah um i don't think in all honesty we can refuse an application on the grounds that the council won't do what it says it will do um this supplies to you know flood defenses and tree planting really it's it's basically our job to ensure that the council does what it says it will do um and all members will have a responsibility under the new committee system to to do that so you know we we need to double down and try and make sure that that everything that we say we're going to do as a council actually gets delivered um flood strategy in particular is is absolutely crucial to the future of our city and and it must be delivered regardless of this particular application so um you know hopefully we might have a government soon that takes those risks a bit more seriously and um will enable us to do that but 40 percent good affordable housing absolutely crucial and the people who are always missing from these debates are to be honest the people who desperately need that housing um you know so on their behalf i'm happy to support this application could i just say in response to john's point about planning enforcement john i'm sure we all share where you're coming from i'm pleased that the chief planner stuck to bite possibly from what planning i believe transferring to planning officers to augment planning enforcement from later this summer so i think there's recognition we need to wipe our game of course um can i therefore move to the vote can i propose that we grant this application subject to successful completion of the 106 agreement um velba thank you uh i do a name vote there's no more of about four chris four velba four at him four and her four john or tom four b four and poor four it's grand the unanimously what is it as you guys suggest um we allowing for rounding if we meet here we are doing and we'll ever backing your seats by quarter to four at the latest can i just impress upon people i don't want to actually delay if you're even a few seconds like you can't possibly in the debate so look forward to seeing you in just over 20 minutes you you [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANK_AUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] [BLANKAUDIO] I am full of admiration for all of you having to wait through all the paperwork and mass of it that you have to absorb before making decisions under such a pressurized conditions as I witnessed at previous meetings. Regarding this site, Bristol needs housing, but not like this. Broad meat offers a great opportunity, but it should be looked to her as a whole. You should be creating an inspiring central area of flagship development for other cities to aspire to. It should not be piecemeal developments as we're seeing at the moment. Imagine mid and low rise places for people to live close to the park and the river, not overlooking a busy road with the awful associated air quality. Please stop the rot of these mountainous high rises. Remember you were elected to represent the views of your constituents and with may in mind, this might be your last opportunity to do the right thing. Don't allow desperate people wanting a home to end up in something that is just better than nothing. Offer them something designed with quality of life at its top priority. Look at the proposal yourself and ask yourself, could not could you, but would you want to live in that building? Thanks, Skin. Rob Harding. St James Priory Project strongly objects to the planning application for the redevelopment of the Devlin site. Our principal concern is the negative impact that the proposed development will have on the setting of the Great One District Church and the Great Two-Star List of Church House, which are in our care. The proposed new development is overbearing and will completely dominate these buildings. While planning policies talk about the need to protect key views and that the highest scale of massing of development should be appropriate to the immediate context, the development does not even attempt to meet these criteria. Indeed, it is difficult for us at least to understand why the Council has such policies when it has so little regard to them. The Council is developing a comprehensive strategy for development. Current applications conform to existing planning policies until the Council adopts a new approach to development. Lastly, improvements to the public ground could be achieved with a much more modest scheme, one which respected neighboring properties complimented rather than dominated this part of broadening. We urge Committee to reject this application. Thank you. Can I thank all members of the public who have submitted submissions? Can we move to the case officer now, who will, with the presentation? I call on that. And it will be note that I've actually, your tyrant of the Germans, reverted to the standard five-minute officer timeline. So I'm afraid if you could focus your comments in that time. Thank you. Okay, so we come to debonums. The proposal is for the demolition of the existing buildings and the erection of a mixed-use development, comprised of residential and commercial floor space together with amenity space, landscaping, public run works, vehicle access and service and arrangements. So the reason it's come for Committee referral to date, there have been 111 objections and 17 letters of support. The main focus of the objections are around design, including the excessive height and negative impact on the skyline, impact on why the heritage assets dominating over historic landmarks. Concerns have been raised about the loss of the existing building. Also, lack of on-site parking, concerns about the amenity of future occupiers, concerns raising impact of the tenure, resulting in lack of proper family dwellings. And suggestions have been made to provide more than the policy compliant 20% affordable housing. We've had objections from historic England, objecting on harm to the setting of heritage assets and suggestion that the north-south route connected through the bare-pitch should be included. Civic society have also objected and so 20th century and Bristol City Council heritage conservation also have raised objections. Here's a site location plan and the red line. You can see the existing building with the two service yards to the east and west. You've got the existing site layout and the proposed site layout. You can see the proposal aims to split the site through the middle to create a pedestrian link, reinstating Bar Street. You see the proposed ground floor plan. Ground floor will be dominated by commercial uses front in the public realm. And there's a proposed first floor plan. You can see the pedestrian route through the site, linking the horse fare to the St James bottom roundabout. You see the proposed south elevations from the horse fare, proposing north elevations from the St James bottom roundabout. And you've got an elevation view through a section through the middle of the site from Bar Street. A proposed section through the east elevations and also through the west and from the south. You've got some design iterations here of how the schemes progressed in terms of detailing, particularly to the top of the building. Here's an example of some of the proposed roof gardens which were formed private amenity space for residents. And you've got the public realm here on Bar Street, which will have options of steps or gentle one to twenty slope that will be pedestrian friendly. So, in terms of design quality, it's a tenured blind design. All units exceed national described space standards to all aspects being maximized. Only nine percent of units are single aspects. It exceeds the urban living SPD in terms of amenity space requirements. All units will be provided with a balcony or balcony. So, view from Merchant Street, continuing on to Bar Street, and then here's a view from the horse fare. You can see the detailing on the corner with the round edge and the depth around the surround of the windows. And you can also see the utilisation of the public space by potential commercial occupiers. It's a view from St. James Barton and there's a pedestrian view there. So, in terms of heritage and the existing building, it's a non-designated heritage asset. And in terms of the loss of the building, the harm has been weighed against the benefits of the scheme in accordance with the MPPF. In terms of the impact on the wider heritage assets, an exercise has been undertaken and wider council and heritage England. And the conclusion is it will lead to less than substantial harm to the identified heritage assets. So, in terms of the test, it would be weighed against the balance against the public benefits in accordance with the MPPF. To provide clear and convincing justification. So, in terms of the planning and balance, obviously, we've covered the fact that there'll be less than significant harm to identified heritage assets. There'll be a lot of an existing building, which is a non-designated heritage asset. However, officers consider that the material considerations, in this case, weigh in favour of the proposal. Name the regeneration of a brownfield site. An introduction of a new pedestrian route in line with the city's draft development plan for the city centre. Creation of new public open space abroad mean, which is 29% of the site area. 502 new dwellings in the city centre and location meeting nationally described space standards. 20% compliant affordable housing, provision of flexible retail, vast economic benefits, 2 million in sale, 1.8 million new homes bonus and also additional jobs. So, there's a positivity in net gain, 100% in terms of creation new habitats. And also, in terms of sustainability, it's BRM excellent and will be connected to the district heat network. So, we come to the recommendation. Officers agree in favour of the proposal in line with the development plan. And we recommend approval, subjects conditions and a 106 agreement and a TRO 278 highway agreement. Thank you. Maybe to answer questions. Thank you, gone right. You slightly did that by two minutes, but if I'm still chairman after May, I'll actually take it off your next presentation. Right, questions? No? Paul? The first one, thank you, sorry. The first one, it's about the, you know, I'm always really concerned about livability and, you know, you said all flats have got balconies or Juliet balconies. How many of them are actually Juliet balconies? Because looking at it, it does seem like a lot of them. And I don't think a Juliet balcony is a balcony. It's not private, well, it is a Juliet balcony, but it's not private outdoor space. So, that's my first question. Another question I have is about the commercial use downstairs. It says on the report to the best of my recollection that 10% is going to be affordable workspace. You know, I wonder, can we do anything about that? That doesn't seem quite enough for me. I mean, I think if we're developing the city centre in the way that we want to develop it, we would want to have more than 10% affordable space for creative industries and startups and Bristolians to get off their feet. So, is there anything that we can do about, you know, making that a higher figure? But another question about the gradient of pastries, whether, I don't know what that actual gradient could be. I mean, I'm sure there must be a way of measuring it. I am very concerned that I'm very concerned about the street in general. I think that we're being persuaded that we're opening up a lovely new boulevard that's going to have access east to west. But actually, what we might be doing is just opening a wind tunnel that's very steep and that people will not be able to access. When you look at it carefully, that sort of sweep you around thing does make it look like it's very steep. And my fourth thing is that I really would want, I really want us now all to look at the verified views because if we could share them, I think they are quite astonishing. You know, you just need to look at them and look at what it's going to do to that area, especially around the bare pit. I mean, you just look at it and there's a huge amount of concrete and they don't even, even with the verified views, they don't go all the way up to the top. So I think I'd like to have the three questions answered and if you will permit me, I think all of our committee today should really look at those verified views. I mean, I'll go further and say that in a recent application which I felt I was able to support the two things. You're actually in to make more questions. I know you're going to stop me. That's fine. I've asked four questions. I always say I'll leave the case officer to respond, but I have to say, you know, well, the purpose of this committee is not to redesign an application in committee. We have to change the condition to work sort of thing, but that's not that we have to judge the scheme in front of us. I think I'm just trying to drill down into some information. That's all I'm trying to do, Chair. Thank you, Chair. So in terms of the balconies question, I think something like 45% of the properties will have a proper balcony. There'll be others with a Juliet balcony, but we tried to implement an actual proper balcony where possible in terms of the orientation of the design. So it's been it's been it's been included where we can to have a balcony in line with sort of SPD guidance and the urban living SPD guidance. What percentage is? So in terms of private outdoor space, 46% have an external balcony or balcony where not possible. Obviously, there is there is availability of outdoor space for everybody beyond the private amount, which exceeds sort of the amount that would be expected in the urban living SPD. By over 100%. So can I just for clarification to say 45% or 46% have private for private balconies or Juliet, so that's the total altogether. It's the Juliets and the balconies or that's correct. But the majority have a private balcony. However, you've got the communal outdoor space that is available for the residents for the wider scheme, which if you calculate all the proposed outdoor space. So if you include the space on the balconies, the private space and the communal outdoor space, it exceeds by over 100% of what would be expected in the urban living SPD. So obviously, there's a creation of a lot of open space here that would be available to residents. You've also got other facilities internally, such as gyms, amenity areas within the buildings that would add to that. And then obviously, there's the opportunity to use the space on Bar Street as well, which is over to the general public. John. So I had other questions and can we look at the pictures? Shall we go to the gradient one now while we try and get some views if possible? And Pip's going to talk about the gradient of Bar Street. I'm going to hand over to Pip now. We've worked very hard with the developer on this because it was a very constrained space. But they went back and redesigned to make sure all the movement from Horsfer up to James Barton would be DDA compliant. And that's what we have to judge it on. So disability access is done. So we did go back and they did redesign the ground first floor movement there. So that would be able to be used. And mostly that's undercover, so it would be actually quite a pleasant movement on there. But we also will be using the existing for them to access things like Amazon deliveries coming down the slope that's Bar Street. So we believe that we've worked with the developer to get the best option possible for that. But I can say that they have made it DDA compliant, which means the gradient will be correct to that standard, which is what we have to do at this stage. And detailed design, which would be conditioned, will require more thorough testing of that. Shall I while Conrad gets up the views? I think that your second question was about the affordable workspace. Did I catch that correctly? No, actually I had another question about the, I think I may have got this wrong, but I felt that there was some questioning about microclimates on the roof terraces. And that there was an issue about wind and creating very wind tunnel areas. So I'd like to have a bit more detail about that. And just for my own benefit, I think maybe I've lost the plot. Did you say that there was only 9% of single aspect? Because I thought in the report 40%. Yeah, so in terms of single aspect units, only 9% of single aspects of all the units. In terms of the sort of wind issues, are you mainly referring to the wind issues on the sort of private, sort of, yeah. So that's been carefully considered in the design and obviously there's been some sort of assessment of that in terms of the impact of wind on those spaces. We've been working on it to mitigate any impacts by various structures that will be conditioned. At this stage we've got like a sort of a wider general plan. However, the finer details and the impact of the wind will proceed in the conditions that we've added on for the finer details. So we'll be looking at the actual physical structures that will be going there. And a sick design group obviously identified the issue of a potential wind impact here. And we feel that a scheme can be delivered with minimal impact to those residents so they can enjoy those areas about the structure from wind. Can I just clarify, it's 9% single aspect north facing or sort of northwest facing, 46% are dual aspect. But certainly, again, this was an area that officers that have worked really hard with the developers and our content with where we've arrived and that is indeed the best possible option given all the constraints on this site. I understand that, but I just wanted to get the facts correct, so 9% single aspect north facing, but about 40% I think it was single aspect. No, 46% dual aspect, 54% single aspect, thank you. Can we see the images? I'm just trying to get them on to this screen, it's the trouble, so let me see if I can change the permissions on here. So we've got many sort of viewpoints here, I mean, this is the list here, we've got 100 figures. I mean, it's something that is being uploaded as part of the submission, you've got the maps out here, some of them. So these are like the existing views and the proposed, and obviously we spent a lot of time considering the impact on wider viewpoints. I mean, this has all sort of been uploaded, so I don't think I can go through all of them, but I mean, specifically what we want to see showing today before members. I'm sorry if I'm being troublesome, but I mean, I'm looking at one now which is taken from, you know, that Piazza where the Metro Bank is in broadmed. And, you know, I think if everybody could see that, you could see that this hugely dominates the space, it's going to be very oppressive, and I really wanted us to see all of those. I mean, could I suggest actually join the debate to Paul has encouraged you to do so we so look at that, please. John. Thank you Chairman, thank you for the report. Or could you turn off your mic, please. I have a question over the economic benefit, which is quite a big factor for me in weighing up the pros and cons and was in the pack that the developer put together. And in particular, brought me retailers to benefit from increased spending of £11 million a year. Can I ask, is there some kind of standard calculation that's used to work that out because I'm struggling to see divided by 500 people, people spending about £2,000 a month of their income with broadmed retailers. So I'm obviously missing some added benefit that comes as part of it. Yeah, so I can verify the calculations, as far as I'm aware, those economic benefits have come from the agents and developers, so they're estimation. So we need to consider them with a pinch of salt, but obviously they're an indication of what could be possible. But clearly, obviously, there would be an impact economically on existing retail under proposed, given adding sort of 502 dwellings in this site in the middle of Broadmead. Because it was in the report, but there's no independent there, only because I'm trying to understand if anyone that lives in Broadmead spends £2,000 a month with Broadmead retailers. Yes, sorry. It doesn't have to be all from the people living there, clearly a scheme like this will massively improve the vibrancy of the city centre and massively increase the football of people visiting, otherwise would not be visiting and I think that is what underlies these calculations. Tom. Thank you. Yes, my first question was one about what consideration, if any, we have to give to the recently consented scheme at the Premier Insight, because obviously that's itself a very tall building. And one of the questions I was trying to picture in my mind was the effect of shadowing and wind tunneling that those two proposals might have when combined together. So if you could touch on that, please, and following on from that, just outline the width of the newly created street, because from those visual impact assessments that Paul was saying, it doesn't look hugely wide, and I'm again concerned about wind tunneling and the possible impact about. So there's been a cumulative impact assessment that's considered the impact of this proposal and the improved Premier Insight. So he's combined them together and assessed various areas such as wind, visual impact on the cityscape, impact on sunlight, impact on neighbour amenity. And generally speaking, there isn't an objection to the combined cumulative impact of both developments. In some ways, this proposal would screen views from the Premier in from the south, for example, so that there's some benefits there. But generally, cumulative impact is not considered unacceptable combined. Now, obviously, you asked about the width of bar street, I think it's around 18 metres, 18.6 metres, it varies at points, but it's around 18 metres. There have been wind assessments to see the impact of that. Obviously, there's a lot of landscaping proposed, which would mitigate the impact of wind tunneling. So generally, we haven't got any concerns that have been raised in terms of impact on the use of that site, the public realm. Can I suggest we actually move to the debate now? Obviously, members will recall that very often we hear people say, arguing against the scheme and saying, ah, that a scheme could be created for this site, of course. In my opinion, I appreciate beauties and their life, they behold it, but this is a good, impulsive scheme deserving of our support. And frankly, even before the Covid pandemic, the shape of retail in Britain was changing, there's no doubt about it more than their space needs to be given over to productive housing. The fact we're getting over 500 units in this scheme, including 20% of affordable housing, and still having 10% commercial employment space on, mainly on the corners of the scheme, is really positive. I also like the fact we're removing a building which frankly, which has been stated, has no intrinsic real benefit, historic benefit, of course, and which blocks the site. We're actually opening that up, creating 30% public realm, which is positive, and recreating a medieval street scene, which is very substantially wide, or that's positive to me. I also say, perhaps I'm viewless, and caught Johnny come lately to Bristol, because my members of my family have only been here since the reformation. But I'm getting a bit irritated by people lecturing us that we shouldn't reach in at rates because of some alleged impact, negative impact on so-called heritage assets. Frank Cloud, I don't believe any heritage asset is affected in a significant or negative way here, so I'll be voting for the scheme. John? Yeah, looking at it, I like it halfway up, and everything else looks great, and I'd like to have placed more weight on my decision on the economic benefit, but I just don't believe the £11,000,000 a year. What I do like, though, is that this isn't student accommodation for once, and that it's going to contribute money to the local economy through council tax and other things, and I don't doubt there will be some kind of economic benefit to the city, if only to provide people with opportunities of housing. So on that basis, I will be voting for it. Thank you. John, if you speak of my mind quite a lot today, but there we go. Again, from the waist down, it's not too bad. I find actually bits of the curve corner so far quite appealing. I'm not convinced by this medieval street scene with it recreating. Again, I have concerns about the wind tunneling. Again, something that John said on my previous meetings was this argument about accepting all development because of the affordable housing, because we need housing. That argument is start to wear a bit thin, because I genuinely do not believe that the quality or the look of this building is good enough. I just think it's incredibly dominating, especially in conjunction with the Premier Inn, two 28-storey buildings right on Stokescraft. No, no, I'm sorry, so I'm going to be voting against that. Do I say it is some, aren't Tom? Yeah, thanks. I think I'll do a bit of repeating of what other people have said really. I welcome the inclusion of the affordable retail space that I take the point really we should be seeking more of that. I actually welcome the reopening of the street. I think that's a nice addition, but I think it would be totally unimaginable to the people when that street was last there to be looking up at this looming tower. The looming tower and the big canyon that have been created, and it's not clear to me from the report that the living conditions of the future residents are particularly brilliant either. Juliet balconies in a small bit of amenity space, 28-storey's up, is not the sort of exceptional quality we should be demanding for this site, as well as the height, scale, massing. It looks like a particularly bland design. So I can't bring myself to vote for it on the grounds of a few affordable units alone. Jim? Yeah, probably be a bit controversial here, but I've lived in Bristol a very long time, and to me the city centre has always been an exceedingly ugly place. And I've looked at the views that Paul is talking about. I do have concerns that the building is higher than you'd like it to be, but most of those views don't to me take it from a beautiful looking city to an ugly one. So from the visual impacts are the things I'm not too worried. What I do remember is that we've been talking for as long as I can remember. We've been talking about having people living in the centre of our cities because they do it so well in Europe and it's kept their cities alive and our city all over Britain. We've done the opposite and we've moved people out of our cities in a lot of places. So I'm very much in favour of bringing people back in to living in the centre and helping to regenerate it. Chris? Yeah, a lot of what Tim said, I agree with. We need people back in the city and I do believe, as John said, there will be a regeneration there. The problem with that in a moment is falling on its feet. I think there will be a lot of people who will go in there. I do like the look of that zigzag up and down for, and I think it was 20% maximum, having a 1 in 20. Which is amazing really because I like some of the cycle paths to be honest. But we're bringing in people to the city centre, the economy will improve. We're also getting council tax out of these and they say there's not student accommodation again. I think there's bits of it I don't like but 95% of it is excellent and I will definitely be voting for it. In response to Tim, yes in European cities they do do it really really well and how do they do that? They bring people into blocks of flats that are about 10 or 12 stories high and that's a human level of living. And I just don't think that putting people into 28 story blocks with very little private or public amenity. I think this, I mean I am getting a bit weary of the medieval street that's being opened up again. Because I mean 18 metres, I don't even know if that's as wide as this chamber. And you're going to pack in all of that, all the landscaping and all the public realm into that. I just think it's, and it's hugely dominant. If you look at the other views of the city where it is going to be injurious and damaging, I just don't think it all stacks up. I definitely, I mean obviously I wanted to regenerate that area as well. And it's with great reluctance that I would be coming to the decision. I wanted to be able to support it but I can't. Or take Andrew then Tom and then I'll test the mood of the members. Thank you Chairman. I find myself in a similar place to last month when we were looking at the Premier Inn application that really wasn't sure, you know, normally you come to a meeting, you've got some kind of idea how you think it's going to go. But you know, as Councillor Jackson mentioned earlier, there are always pros and cons to every application we have before. It's up to us to weigh and balance and come to a decision. You know, this scheme does have clear benefits as highlighting officers' report. You know, housing provision very important. And as Councillor Ripperton said, we need to bring people back into our city centres to live in our city centres, to animate those city centres, not just during the daytime, nine to five months Friday. But you know, in the evening as well, weekends, we've got to have people in our city centres, keeping our city centres alive. Broadmed is basically dying on its feet. We've got to kind of start the rejuvenation. And I think this scheme is part of that rejuvenation. I do like the public realm. I know people have been a bit dismissive of that, but I think, you know, the improvement of public realm is really crucial and making attractive places that people want to visit and want to hang around in. So I think, yes, there are drawbacks. Of course, there are going to be impacts on heritage assets, but they've been assessed as less than substantial harm. It is a very high building and I'm not a huge fan of high buildings, but I think they do work well in a cluster. And we do have the premier insight coming forward. I think this site will be part of a cluster of taller buildings that I think will work quite well in the city centre. I know it's not everyone's cup of tea, but, you know, we are delivering 500 housing units. I think that is the key as well, isn't it? So on balance, I will be supporting this development. Thank you, and Tom, bearing in mind, it's all taken time. Could I urge you to be quite brief if that's possible? Well, I was actually going to suggest, Chair, that we should extend the debate, given that there seems to be, you know, a bit of uncertainty amongst us here. Because, you know, I could potentially be persuaded the other way. I think the main thing for me, as we've sort of covered before, is that it doesn't seem to respond to the context. It seems way too high. Some of those visual immunity, visual impact assessments, looking down that corridor towards the newly opened street. You know, it's got these two huge towers on either side of it, and it just looks like a big canyon. But I do agree with people that have said, you know, that we should be trying to redevelop this site and that we should be introducing housing into it. So I'm a little bit torn, and I'd be willing to hear another round of speeches if you'd... No. Councillor Ruppington did admit to me, if we hadn't removed one bed and scream from the agenda, he might be asleep by that time. Anyway, I'm going to move, we grant the application with conditions. Do I have a second? Please, Chris, thank you. Can I do a name vote? I'll vote for Chris. I'll vote for Philba. For Tim. For Andrew. For John. For Tom. Against. The. Against. Against. And that's how the mainly passed. Can I thank you for your attendance? It hasn't been quite as arduous as before. Those, I've already mentioned those who are retiring. Those of you who are standing for re-election colliding wish you good luck. And hopefully we'll see those of us who survive after next Thursday. And we've finished in good times. So those of you who want to rush off canvassing, you can do so. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. Thank you. [BLANKAUDIO]