‘Absurd’ housing scheme approved despite widespread criticism
Plans for the first phase of a new housing development on the fringe of Birmingham city centre have been approved – despite stinging criticism of the scheme’s design.
Several members of Birmingham City Council’s planning committee said the proposals for the Icknield Port Loop were poorly thought out and had the potential to be hazardous.
One councillor even branded the scheme a “deathtrap” for children and slammed the design as “absurd”.
(See designs below)
The IPL is considered one of Birmingham’s most important brownfield sites. The scheme proposes hundreds of new homes plus a mix of supporting amenities on a 43-acre site fringing the city centre.
The partnership leading the redevelopment comprises Urban Splash – best known for its Rotunda and Fort Dunlop schemes – and Places for People, in collaboration with landowners Canals & River Trust and Birmingham City Council.
The first phase of the scheme includes 207 family homes; 117 of which will be terraces of two to five bedrooms, with terraces opening onto shared residential courtyard gardens.
The proposals also include 40 modular townhouses which are being created using the Urban Splash modular blueprint – House. This offers residents the chance to design the layout and composition of their home. Their designs are then precision-built to individual specification in a factory, before being craned into position.
Cllr Barry Henley said the courtyard scheme and the back-to-back design of some of the housing being proposed was absurd.
He said the back-to-back design had been condemned by the city decades ago and to reinstate it now would be asking trouble in the future.
He was also critical of the canyoning-nature of the scheme and said it was a potential deathtrap to have houses backing onto the canal, especially if the development was being marketed for young families.
The courtyard design would also invite privacy issues, he added.
Cllr Gareth Moore said the scheme was a display of style over substance and said the city needed “proper” housing rather than the scheme being proposed for the new development.
Planning officers said the designs submitted were acceptable and it would be down to individual choice about whether people wanted to live there.
The plans were approved by the committee but only on the casting vote of chairman, Cllr Mike Sharpe, who said he had to side with his officers.
Icknield Port Loop housing design
How the Icknield Port Loop scheme will look
The overall concept for the Icknield Port Loop scheme
How the completed Icknield Port Loop scheme could look
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