HOUSING

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More homes than originally expected are due to be built on Derby College's Pride Parkway site in Alvaston. Initially, the college submitted an outline planning application to Derby City Council for 435 homes and now a trio of building developers have submitted a fresh joint application for 598 homes. The developers, which include Barratt Homes East Midlands, based in Chilwell, Nottingham, bought the site for £10m and it is likely to be developed over a two-year period.

The other developers are Kings-Oak, a low-cost housing arm of Barratt Homes, and Morris Homes East Midlands, based in Castle Donington. The 598 units on the 38-acre site will be 310 houses and 288 apartments with open space in the north-east of the site acting as an extension to Alvaston Park. Previously, 175 flats and 260 houses were due to be built alongside seven acres of open space. The housing development had already led to concerns about extra traffic, amenity and school problems.

John Stewart, from the city council's planning department, said, "The amount of open space appears largely unchanged. The original outline application was only ever a guideline about housing numbers and we always knew that the plan could ultimately be for more or less homes on the site." Derby College is moving its facilities to other sites in the city and is hoping to renovate the Grade-II listed Roundhouse building near to the railway station at a cost of £28m as a new technology centre. (Source: Derby Evening Telegraph)

Six hundred houses could be built on fields off Radbourne Lane, in Amber Valley Borough Council's local development plan. Residents in Mackworth and Mickleover fear the extra traffic generated by the new homes could cause gridlock on the roads during peak hours. In 2002, the council threw out another proposal for 300 homes on the same site, however, the council must provide 860 homes somewhere within the borough and highlighted the land off Radbourne Lane as a prime location.

Development policy manager, Derek Stafford, said the borough council was hoping that neither Derbyshire County Council nor Derby City Council would object on the grounds that the borough council was not making provision for the full 860 homes it was expected to. Members of the parish council presented a petition to around 100 residents who attended Mackworth Village Hall to voice their concerns over the proposals and called on them to write letters expressing their fears to the borough council and the Government.

Residents believe the plans do not include a new school or dentists and doctors' surgeries and, if given the green light, the influx of 600 families to the area would put great pressure on existing facilities. Richard Wood, of Mackworth parish council, said, "Our main objections are that this is a green land site and we all know that 600 houses would not stop at 600 and would spread out. They're looking at putting expensive houses up where people will have two cars. They'll be working south-east of Derby, so they'll go along Radbourne Lane, onto the A52 and that will generate massive traffic problems at Markeaton island." (Source: Derby Evening Telegraph)

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