Chepstow was the house at the bottom of the Avenue, bought up and demolished by Telfords. They have submitted a second set of plans for building houses and three blocks of flats on the site.
The first set of plans were refused by the Bristol Inspectorate and to say that this second set of designs does not meet with the approval of the residents would be something of an understatement!
On 18th March there was a meeting of the Redbridge Regulatory Committee where this matter was to be decided. Speakers from the Wanstead Society and the Counties Resident’s Association (the CRA) were ready and waiting to say their pieces against the proposed development.
The CRA has been pushing for conservation status for this Edwardian estate consisting of Rutland, Warwick, Hereford, Gloucester and Buckingham roads plus Grosvenor Rd. Grove Park and The Avenue. A decision on this is very near. The Chepstow site occupies a whole corner of Leicester and Buckingham Road and so would be included in a conservation area.
So… on the 18th March, there we were ready and waiting to give our best arguments against the Telford plans when the chairman announced that since the decision re. granting conservation status to the area was very near, the matter would be deferred to the next Regulatory Committee meeting when the situation should be clearer.
If the area were granted Conservation Status, this presumably would affect the quality of the development plans which could be accepted and might lead to a second refusal of the Telford plans but this is by no means a foregone conclusion. We could be cautiously optimistic but there are several possible outcomes. We are hoping that conservation status will be granted to the whole of the requested area. (Support for this came over very loud and clear both from residents and councillors at the last Area 1 Committee Meeting). This should have a knock on effect re. the Chepstow development but there is many a slip between cup and lip so we wait with baited breath for the outcome of these two intertwined matters.