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Proposed Re-Development
The Former 'Follies Cabaret Restaurant' Site
Harbour Road, Onchan, IoM.
into 'Howstrake Court', Sheltered Housing Apartment Complex
This is a submission of a revised scheme following the refusal at appeal of application PA07 / 00883 / B, which had previously been approved by the Planning Committee. The scheme has been developed and amended after detailed discussions with Mr lan McCauley the Director of Planning, together with Mrs Fiona Mullen and Mr A Holmes (DLGE Senior Planning Officer and Planning Officer respectively), following a recommendation from the Minister within the refusal notice to the previous application. The revised scheme has taken into account the comments raised by the Inspector within his report, and the reason for refusal identified within the written notice.
The application site covers approx. 1.2 acres in area, and is located on Harbour Road in the village of Onchan. In the recent past, the site has been in use as 'Follies Cabaret Restaurant and Bar' but prior to this has been used as a restaurant, public house and was originally the Howstrake Hotel.
The site is accessed from Harbour Road at a single point at its North East boundary, and has a significant fall across the site from a little over 67.3 m at the North East corner to 61.2 m at the South West corner.
The existing building was a two storey structure which was amended and re-modelled a number of times in the past, including the removal of the majority of its pitched roof and its replacement with a part pitched and part flat roof. The building sat at the lower part of the site, within the South West corner, occupying approximately one fifth of the site area. The majority of the rest of the site, to the North East is tarmac, providing car parking spaces for the former restaurant.
Following the decision on the previous application, the applicant's architect carried out consultations with a variety of interested parties to establish a basis for the design. These have included;
Mr I McCAuley - DoLGE - Director of Planning Mrs F Mullen - DoLGE - Senior Planning Officer Mr A Holmes - DoLGE - Planning Officer Mr D Sewell - DoT Highways Division - Highways Design Engineer Mr B Price - Onchan Commissioners - Foul \& Surface Water Design Engineers The comments raised and advice given within the above consultation meetings had been incorporated into the proposal.
Mr Sewell, the DoT - Highways Division Design Engineer recommended a parking ratio of one car parking space per apartment for the occupants, with one space per two apartments for visitors. Ten percent of these spaces should be for disabled provision. In addition, a vision splay of $90 \mathrm{~m} \times 2.4 \mathrm{~m}$ was recommended for the entrance point.
Mr Price has provided the location, depths and capacity of the existing public foul drainage sewers within the vicinity of the development. There is no record or evidence of public surface water sewerage within the site.
The proposal is a development of private sheltered housing apartments. It is proposed that the development will primarily be for the over 50's. However, the design of the majority of the apartments, with level thresholds, wide door openings, spacious hallways, and full wet rooms, will also be suitable for those members of the community with mobility problems or disabilities. For this reason, the applicant intends that the development should not exclusively be for over 50's only, but would also be available to those with disability or mobility problems. The design approach of the proposal is to create a high quality development with a pleasant open aspect for the residents.
The development takes the form of two main blocks of apartments, one to the North-East of the site running parallel with Harbour Rd, which accommodates 10 apartments, together with an apartment for the warden and the communal gathering space accommodation. To the South West corner of the site is the main apartment block, which is situated within the footprint of the former building that occupied the site. This block is set at a lower ground floor level to the former building, and therefore the eaves level of the proposal is below the roof level of the previous building. Between the two main blocks is a pair of semi-detached bungalows, which provide a further mix of accommodation within the development as a whole.
The apartment block which runs parallel to Harbour Road is two-storey in height, with an archway to provide vehicular access through to and from Harbour Road. This block also has a basement which houses 21 parking spaces, together with a new MEA sub-station to replace that currently housed on the site. A lift serves the apartments above from this basement. The block has been designed with accommodation partially within the roof space to the gable walls of the block, which has reduced the effective height of the block where it is closest to the existing properties of $1 \& 3$ Marine View Close, and the adjacent property at 11 Kirkway. These gables have two windows at ground floor and two at first floor to each end. However, these serve bathrooms only and will be fitted with obscure glazing. Therefore there is no possibility that the proposed block can infringe the privacy of the adjoining occupants at this location.
This block is also situated along the building line created by No. 1 Marine View Close and No. 11 Kirkway, which is therefore set back some 4.5 m into the site. The distance between the Harbour Road elevation of the proposal is therefore in excess of 21 m from the existing properties situated on the opposite side of Harbour Road.
The main block located to the South-West of the site now accommodates 12 apartments, the communal accommodation having been re-located to the first floor of the Harbour Road block over the entrance archway. The first floor apartments which face towards No. 18 Furman Close and No.'s $8 \& 9$ Kirkway, have been amended to remove all windows situated within the walls along this elevation. Natural light and ventilation is provided to the rooms along this elevation at first floor, by the use of large roof-lights situated within the sloping roof section. This means that at first floor, there is no possibility of there being a view towards the above properties which could possibly infringe the privacy or the amenity of the occupiers of these properties.
This main block has also been rotated by a further couple of degrees, thus bringing the line of the rear of the block a further 1.5 m away from the South-West corner boundary away from the rear of No. 7 Kirkway and therefore maintaining privacy at this location. It should be noted, however, that none of the occupants of either No.7, 8 or 9 Kirkway objected to the previous application.
The balconies which were included on the previous application to the living rooms of the first floor apartments at the Furman Close and Kirkway ends of the block have been removed to address further any concerns of privacy issues for the neighbouring residents.
Within the central courtyard area created by the two main blocks, one of the former four apartment blocks included within the previous application has been retained in position on plan, but reduced in height to provide a pair of semi-detached bungalows. This provides both a variety of possible accommodation for future residents, but also creates an open aspect within the development. This open aspect has been aided by the inclusion of the basement parking for 21 cars within the Harbour Road block, which has reduced the amount of surface parking within the development.
The development now provides a total of 24 apartments of varying sizes and configurations, giving choice for future residents. In addition to these apartments there is provision for wardens accommodation, a communal social gathering lounge/dining room with kitchen facilities for social gatherings and functions, together with an entrance foyer area with two disabled standard w.c.'s.
The total parking provision is 21 basement spaces with a further 17 surface spaces, giving a total of 38 car parking spaces. This accords with the recommendation of the DoT Highways Division, in providing 1 space per apartment for residents and 1 space per two apartments for visitors. A further space is provided for the duty warden. Of these 38 spaces, 7 are designated disabled spaces, meaning that the level of disabled parking provision is nearly $20 \%$ of the spaces provided.
The surface parking areas are distributed throughout the development to break up the impact of the parking, and to provide parking of a disabled nature as close as possible to the entrances of the various apartment blocks. These parking spaces are broken up with landscaping between and around them to provide screening of the parked cars, both for the residents of the development and those surrounding the site.
The proposals are in a traditional architectural style in a mix of clay facing brickwork, rough cast render, tile hanging and half timbering, with a good level of detail. The style is reminiscent of the arts and crafts movement, of which there are a number of examples within the Onchan area. The development is designed within a human scale and a domestic architecture, which is familiar to both residents and the local community.
The type of development, as a sheltered housing complex, is a significantly better neighbour than the existing usage of the site, both from the viewpoint of the level of traffic generated, and from the significantly reduced noise and disturbance potential.
In conclusion, the applicant believes that the proposal has addressed the comments of the Inspector and the reasons for refusal of the previous application, and makes a positive contribution to the surrounding area and community. The proposal has improvement benefits from a visual perspective, from its reduction of the traffic load at this locality, and from the removal of the noise and disturbance caused by the previous use of the site, which had become an unfriendly neighbour in the recent past.
The applicant would respectfully ask the committee consider all of the above matters, when determining the application.
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