Construction is underway to create more bedrooms for elderly people at a care home in Reading.
Northcourt Lodge is a 22-space nursing home near the university area, located in Northcourt Avenue.
The care home provides residential, dementia, nursing, and respite care for older adults.
While residents are expected to pay for their care themselves, stays can be funded partially through top-ups from local councils.
Contractors are currently at work on the site to build a new two-storey building containing 13 double bedrooms.
Construction is well underway on the new care home rooms.
Photos from the site show part of the entrance of the lodge being blocked off at one stage during the works, and part of the site sealed off while construction takes place.
Workers were also seen with piping for the utilities required for the new building.
Other photos show the building completed, but more work is required to install utilities and remediate the land.
The project is taking place after the care company won permission for the new building from Reading Borough Council in 2022.
The company, Northcourt Lodge Care Home Ltd, applied to relocate a seven-space car parking area, create a new access path and relocate bins in May.
If approved, the parking spaces would be moved from an area immediately south of the existing building near Northcourt Avenue to an area north of the existing building near Wellington Avenue.
Objecting to the change in a handwritten letter, a neighbour wrote: “Although my garden only has one corner that connects to Northcourt Lodge land, I feel I will notice the change in the planning application considerably.
“The different circumstances that are now being applied for are going to make a considerable difference to the nearby gardens in Wellington Avenue.
“Cars will be coming very close to my garden to park, turn around and leave.
“This will involve fumes, the noise of doors closing and light disturbance from headlights.”
They also lamented a loss of garden space within the lodge site.
The plan has been justified as a more ideal site design for existing and future occupants.
You can view the application by typing reference PL/26/0299 into the council’s planning portal.
Nursing homes in England are monitored by the Care Quality Commission (CQC), which operates in a similar fashion to Ofsted.
The last CQC inspection of Northcourt Lodge took place in March 2021, where it was granted an overall rating of ‘Good’.
The report largely focused on measures staff had taken to keep residents safe during the coronavirus pandemic.
This was reviewed in July 2023, with the CQC finding no evidence that a reassessment was necessary at that time.
