£100m plan for Turner Bros site knocked back
ROCHDALE Borough Council has has rejected a controversial planning application to redevelop the former Turner & Newall asbestos factory site at Spodden Valley.
Heywood-based MMC Estates was pursuing an application originally submitted to by Countryside Properties in 2005 build a £100m scheme containing more than 600 homes on the 72 acre site, which was once the home of the world’s biggest asbestos factory.
Campaigners who were fearful about the potential problems that could be caused by using mechanical diggers on the site have opposed the developers’ plan, arguing that not enough work has been done to ensure the site is safe.
Rochdale Metropolitan Borough’s head of planning and regulation, Peter Rowlinson, said: “The council has rejected MMC Estates’ initial planning application to develop the former Turner Brothers site because it did not provide enough detail about the way the council’s conditions for the safe and timely development of the site would be met.
“MMC Estates have the right to submit a further application and have indicated that they intend to do this.
“Whilst MMC Estates remain the owners and their aspirations have not changed, the refusal does provide the opportunity to take a fresh look at the site.”
MMC initially bought the site in 2004 and and a planning application was submitted to Rochdale Council in December that year to redevelop the site. Some initial site clearance work began, but the application was later placed on hold until further risk assessment was carried out.
The council added that it was willing to work with any agency that is able to secure the safe and timely development of the site, and council Leader Colin Lambert argued that the rejection of this initial application “offers a new opportunity to move the site forward”.
A spokesman for the group campaigning against the site’s development, Save Spodden Valley, said that a refusal to grant permission was “the only credible decision” given that the application hadn’t been determined for six years”.
“How this situation was ever allowed to occur is a fair question. The former asbestos factory site is of international significance as the worlds first of its type and the longest period of continuous asbestos production.”
The former Turner & Newall plant was the first factory in the country set up to weave asbestos cloth back in the 1870s and asbestos continued to be produced there until its closure in 1998.
Mark Russell, managing director of MMC Developments, said: “The Countryside Properties (Northern) Limited 2005 planning application was today refused in an agreement between Rochdale Planning Department and MMC Developments Limited to enable MMC to work up a new application which will fully satisfy the expectations and aspirations of the local authority and the wider stakeholder community.
“MMC had taken conduct of the Countryside application after Countryside’s withdrawal. The application contained insufficient detail in several elements.
“MMC remains certain that the only viable way to deliver the Turner Brothers site back into good economic use for the benefit of the Rochdale community without the need for millions of pounds of public money is via a further application leading to a residential-led development solution.
“This will deliver the value required to safely clean up to the very highest standards the historic contamination which arose during the Turner Brothers years.
“MMC is committed to delivering a solution which will save this potentially beautiful area of Spodden Valley, and we welcome local support for a new scheme which, in addition to paying to clean up the historic contamination, will provide much-needed good quality family housing and local amenities.”
