ING RE submitted its next round of proposed plans for the harbour redevelopment from 30 November to December 30, 2005.  Hayle Council will be meeting with ING RE's representatives and PDC planners following the public exhibition.

I will be reviewing the plans carefully and would welcome comments from you on areas of concern.  At the draft stage, I have made comments on a couple of areas.  These are:

• The design and position of the access road from North Quay to Hayle Terrace.  This is presently shown as a bridge across Copperhouse Pool from the swimming pool to Merchant Curnow's quay - which is a listed structure.

• The use of green field sites for the construction of housing.  The area behind Clifton Terrace is protected in the Local Plan under policy TV2.

• The phasing of the development which is weighted towards house construction in the early phases.

The Swing Bridge

The current harbour plans call for the construction of a new bridge across Copperhouse Pool which would land on the listed quay at Hayle Terrace (Merchant Curnow's Quay). In discussions with the ING architect, Mike Franklin, I was told that ING was unable to purchase the swing bridge so that construction of the new bridge was their only option to provide access to the harbour development.

My concern is that the proposed new concrete bridge impacts on at least two listed structures and on Copperhouse Pool itself. It also violates the strictures of the recent Cornwall and Scilly Urban Survey which exhorted us to “improve the environs of St. Elwyn’s Church.” And it could possibly affect our status as a World Heritage Site.

Historic View of the Bridge 

It seems to me that we can achieve two objectives by using the swing bridge instead of a new bridge:

1. We can renovate the swing bridge and make it a feature of the World Heritage Site rather than obscuring it.
2. We can avoid further defacement of Copperhouse Pool, a listed quay and “the environs of St. Elwyn’s Church”

In order to understand the situation as clearly as possible, I contacted the bridge owners to see what their view was.
The bridge is owned by:

BRB (Residuary) Ltd.
Room C5,
Hudson House
Toft Green
York, YO1 6HP
01904-524701

The point of contact is Mr. John Clarke (john.clarke@brbr.gov.uk).

Mr. Clarke explained that under the Highways Acts, BRBR cannot sell the bridge to anyone except a statutory highway authority. In practice this means that they can only sell to Cornwall County Council (under Section 94 of the Highways Act, 1980). They would be delighted to do this, however, and would include a dowry with the transfer. The County would then be responsible for its maintenance in perpetuity.

Approx. £80,000 has been spent on maintenance and repairs over the last 5 years, £30, 000 on a cycleway. It was strengthened in Oct 2001 and work completed in Mar 2003, to carry 40-44t lorries.

Young Anglers at Hayle - Stanhope Forbes, 1930

Painted from Merchant Curnow’s Quay

Under normal circumstances I can understand the County being reluctant to take on this responsibility. In the case of this major development, however, there is a strong case for pressuring the County to do this. Since SWERDA, GOSW, CABE and many other governmental and quasi-governmental organisations are involved with this project - and SWERDA is talking of investing £30 million in it - it seems that there could be a way of inducing the County to buy the bridge with payments from BRBR, SWERDA and ING. I believe it would still be cheaper for ING than building a bridge, and there would be less heritage damage.

Download plan in higher resolution.

Harbour Update 25 October 2006:

At a meeting called by the Hayle Chamber of Commerce and attended by SWERDA, GOSW, PDC, HTC, CCC, ING RE and the Highways Agency, all attendees reaffirmed their commitment to the regeneration of Hayle.  SWERDA is now investing £35 million in the harbour project which has grown to £210 million.  The target date for planning submission is now second quarter 2007 and therre will be another public exhibition prior to that.

Harbour Update 7 Feb 2006:

Stephen Berry of ING and Mike Franklin of FSP, the lead architects and planners, came to Hayle on Monday, February 6th to make a presentation to the Hayle Harbour Users Association on hydrological modelling of the harbour and future sluicing.  The presentation was by by Tim Cheshire of the hydrological consultants, Wallingford and concluded that the sluicing regime used for over 100 years was in fact the optimum one.  More importantly, it is the plan to restore sluicing from both Copperhouse Pool and Carnsew.

On Tuesday, Mike Franklin gave a report to the Townscape project team and advised:

• 2000 people came to the exhibition in December and 200 comments were received, almost all of a positive nature.

• Hayle is now at the forefront of the South West Regional Development Agency's (SWRDA) agenda.

• Based on comments received, ING now plans to bring the employment-generating elements of the proposal forward into the early phases.  This includes the building in support of the WaveHub project.

• ING has had meetings with the Combined Universities in Cornwall (CUC) with regard to the education facilities to be placed on the harbour.  There is an interest now in providing courses associated with the 'leisure' industry.

A planning application is now likely to be submitted in May 2006.

Harbour Update, 10 May 2006:

Mike Franklin of Architects and Planners FSP, gave a presentation to Hayle Town Council and answered questions for over 2-1/2 hours on the 10th May.

Key points to emerge were:

• The planning application is expected to be submitted to Penwith District Council in August and will be a full planning application for Phase I and an outline application for Phases 2-4.

• The project will focus on a number of regional and local objectives, including improving employment opportunities in four areas: shellfish added value; the arts; ICT businesses; and the Wave Hub.

• There will also be facilities to benefit the local community, such as an open-air or covered theatre.

• The income streams needed to cover the cost of repairing the infrastructure and to cover non-revenue producing items must come from housing and SWERDA have approved 1000 houses.  ING have proposed 870 as being sufficient to make the project feasible.  170 of the 870 houses will be designated as 'affordable' and will be administered by PDC.

• The allocation of the shop units will be done with care to ensure they do not conflict with existing retailers and provide an interesting shopping environment.

• Much thought has been given to handicapped access throughout the project, including beach access.

• The development of the land behind Clifton Terrace has been given much thought including the screening of the site from the town.  The violation of the local plan restriction in this area has been negotiated with SWERDA and GOSW.

• ING is pushing for a junction at Tolroy and PDC are assisting with the lobbying of higher government levels.

• Restrictions on further development around Phillack and the Towans can be controlled through a Section 106 agreement.

There were many other items discussed at the meeting and minutes will be available in due course.