Adjustments to flats that will be built on the site of the former Reading gas tower have been welcomed, but confusion remains over parking arrangements.
The gas tower in East Reading was deconstructed in April 2022 after being installed just short of 100 years ago in 1916.
Plans to build on the site first surfaced in 2019, with the developer applying to create 130 flats in three apartment blocks coming in at nine, five and two storeys tall.
An initial project was approved in November 2019, but had to be adjusted to account for post-Grenfell fire regulations and other changes.
One of these was to turn a two-bed flat into a three-bed flat, resulting in 48 one-bed, 73 two-bed and nine three-bed apartments.
Of those, 12 two-bed and three three-bed flats are designated as affordable, with five being for affordable rent and 10 being shared ownership.
All of these affordable flats will be contained in block C, which is two-storeys tall.
The developer also swapped gas boilers for air-source heat pumps, and reduced car parking spaces by six from 127 to 121.
These changes were discussed at a Reading Borough Council planning applications committee meeting on July 22.
John Ennis (Labour, Southcote), lead councillor for climate strategy, said: “The heat pumps for energy efficiency and carbon emissions reduction can only be welcomed.
“For the reduction of parking spaces, the Prime Minister [Andy Burnham] has just dropped the bus fares from £3 to £2.
“I spent all my journey on the bus thinking ‘how am I going to get that into planning?’ Well, there you go!”
Also welcoming the adjustments, cllr James Moore (Liberal Democrats, Tilehurst) said: “All the changes appear to be really, really good: the removal of gas boilers, it appears to be bringing the application up to date. I’m not particularly bothered about the reduction in car parking.”
But there was confusion about parking arrangements.
Initially, block C had 12 surface parking spaces located outside of it, with three of these being disabled spaces.
But revised plans appeared to indicate these all being designated as electric vehicle (EV) charging spaces, which was pointed out by Micky Leng (Labour, Whitley), lead councillor for planning.
Cllr Richard Davies (Labour, Thames) said: “It’s unfortunate that, in reality, there’ll be a detrimental impact on affordable housing parking provision.
“These spaces were allocated, pragmatically, for the people in those flats, now they are going to be used by people with EVs from all the blocks.”
Planning officer Richard Eatough theorised the disabled parking may have been moved into blocks A or B, as all EV spaces had to be removed from the multi-storey blocks due to fire safety.
Cllr Josh Williams (Green, Park) argued parking is important for disabled people, those in affordable housing and EV drivers.
As a remedy, a condition was devised stating that parking priorities must be seen and approved by Thames ward councillors.
The adjustments were unanimously approved.
You can view the approved application by typing reference PL/25/0697 into the council’s planning portal.
