Developers behind ambitious plans for hundreds of new homes and a ‘Sporting Quarter’ next to Ashton Gate Stadium have overcome a major objection to the scheme over flooding. The objection had threatened to scupper the entire project.
Bristol Sport owner Steve Lansdown and his team want to build more than 500 new homes on a green field site on the edge of Bristol - which will help pay for a basketball arena, conference centre, hotel and flats next to the stadium. But the plans had been thrown into doubt earlier this summer when the Environment Agency formally objected, saying it would be a flood risk. It meant Bristol City Council could not give planning permission without the entire scheme being referred to a Government minister.
But now, Bristol Live can reveal the Environment Agency has now withdrawn its objection after Bristol Sport tweaked the plans to overcome it, and is no longer standing in the way of the development happening. The Lansdown family’s property and development company Esteban Holdings has applied for outline permission for up to 510 new homes on around half the land where a new stadium was proposed more than 10 years ago, between Ashton Vale and the Long Ashton Park and Ride site on the A370.
Read more: The 39 new developments in Bristol that will change the city as we know it
Bristol Sport said the new development, called Longmoor Village, would help pay for the Ashton Gate Sporting Quarter, a major development next to the stadium which would see a hotel, flats and a multi-storey car park built around a 5,000-capacity arena and conference centre. It would primarily be a home for the Bristol Flyers basketball team and would be Bristol’s biggest indoor events venue.
Work was scheduled to have started by now, but the double planning application has been mired in delays and objections at City Hall. It was initially submitted way back in June 2021, and more than a year later still has not yet been put before city councillors to make a decision.
A large chunk of the reason for that has been the objections of the Environment Agency who, as recently as a month ago, told city planners they were formally objecting to the plans for the homes, despite a number of meetings to overcome the objections. Back on August 4, the Environment Agency told Bristol City Council it was objecting to the Longmoor Village housing development, because it was being built between two rivers - the Longmoor Brook and Colliters Brook.
The bridges that crossed the rivers, along with the new homes being built, would increase the risk of flooding in the area. The Environment Agency said flooding could have been caused on the Longmoor Village site or elsewhere on the river catchment area. The Environment Agency told Bristol City Council that its objection meant that even if city councillors gave the Longmoor Village development planning permission, it would have to then automatically go to the Secretary of State at Whitehall.
The August 4 letter from the Environment Agency told council chiefs: “We maintain our objection (to) the proposed development on flood risk grounds… This circular prevents you from issuing planning permission without first referring the application to the Secretary of State, to give them the opportunity to call-in the application for their own determination. This process must be followed unless we are able to withdraw our objection to you in writing. A failure to follow this statutory process could render any decision unlawful, and the resultant permission vulnerable to legal challenge.”
There was a precedent for this. In March this year plans to relocate the Caravan Club caravan site from Baltic Wharf on Bristol’s harbourside to a new site on the banks of the River Avon opposite Cumberland Basin fell foul of the rule. Even though the city council gave permission for the move, the Environment Agency objected because of the risk of flooding, and the Secretary of State over-ruled the council and refused permission, backing the Environment Agency's view.
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Those behind the housing development and Sporting Quarter plan were determined that would not happen at Longmoor Village and changed the plans enough for the Environment Agency to be satisfied.
Last Friday, the Environment Agency wrote again to change their position. “We are satisfied that the wider elements of the proposed development are safe and will not increase flood risk elsewhere,” they told planners. "We have no objections, subject to the comments outlined in this letter and the inclusion of the conditions…in any grant of outline planning consent.”
With the hurdle overcome, it is understood both applications could go before the planning committee within weeks, but there are still huge objections to the idea of building more than 500 new homes on the green field site. It looks set to still be one of the most controversial planning applications to go before councillors this year.
North Somerset Council has formally objected to the proposal, saying it will effectively join up the village of Long Ashton to the rest of Bristol. This is despite the fact that North Somerset’s own planners are working on its Local Plan to enable developers to build hundreds of new homes a short distance away in and around the hamlet of Yanley, on the edge of the Bristol-North Somerset boundary.
And there are also a total of 168 objections from local residents to the scheme, who say new homes should not be built on green field sites in Bristol.
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Read more on the Ashton Gate Sporting Quarter saga:
- Dec 2020 - New plans for 'Longmoor Village' development revealed
- June 2021 - Final plans for Sporting Quarter and Longmoor Village submitted
- June 2021 - In pictures - what Ashton Gate's Sporting Quarter and Longmoor Village would look like
- October 2021 - Councillors pass motion against building homes on green field sites in South Bristol
- March 2022 - Number of people objecting to Longmoor Village plan reaches 150
