Two fields north of Swansea will make way for 166 new homes after Swansea Council's planning committee unanimously approved a Barratt Homes scheme. They will be built on six hectares of land off Llewellyn Road, Penllergaer, with access off a short link road called Mount Crescent.
The application was originally for 180 homes but the number was reduced following discussions with planning officers about design, road safety and so-called green infrastructure.
Fifteen per cent of houses in new estates in this area of Swansea should be classed as affordable, but Barratt Homes contended that the project would not be viable at this level - and council officers accepted the viability assessment it put forward. Instead, the affordable housing allocation will be 10%, and Barratt Homes must also contribute £1,372,504 towards education provision.
The housebuilder won't have to contribute £108,000 towards a multi-use games area because, according to the planning report before the committee, the most appropriate site for it would be on common land nearby. The report said that if taken forward, the council would need to provide exchange land, and these "significant question marks" made the contribution unjustified. However, Barratt Homes' education contribution includes the extra £108,000.
There were 64 letters of objection to the application on grounds including drainage concerns, disruption, and pressure on roads and the nearby M4 junction. But speaking at the committee meeting, Francesca Evans, senior planner at Barratt Homes, said the scheme would bring a number of benefits, including new open space and jobs. She said the project involved "high abnormal costs".
Penllergaer councillor Wendy Fitzgerald said she didn't object to the application as outline approval had previously been granted, but she expressed a number of concerns. She asked why the multi-use games area could not be built on the estate and said that, if not, the £108,000 contribution towards it should be for parks in Penllergaer, not education, as some of the schools which will benefit weren't in the village.
Cllr Fitzgerald also wanted to know why a large proportion of the education money was allocated to Penllergaer Primary School as she said it would close when a new one was built at a huge housing estate under construction nearby, called Parc Mawr. She also said Mount Crescent residents would lose parking spaces, although four off-road spaces will be provided for them nearby.
Councillors on the committee asked whether new roads within the 166-home estate would be adopted by the council, how it would affect journey times in Penllergaer, and how far away the nearest property would be to the RSPCA Llys Nini Animal Centre.
Officers said the nearest home would be 350m away from Llys Nini, which hadn't objected to the application, and that the scheme would not have a big impact on journey times or the nearby motorway junction. A highways officer said traffic levels were back to pre-pandemic levels but that peak hour journeys "are still suppressed".
Speaking after the meeting, Cllr Fitzgerald said she had emailed the planning department for a response about why the multi-use games area couldn't be located at the new estate.
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