Scrap Lowood Estate housing plans, council told

EXCLUSIVE by DOUG COLLIE

Scottish Borders Council has been strongly advised not to allocate Lowood Estate land, near Melrose, for hundreds of new homes even though the local authority has splashed out £11 million of taxpayers' money to buy the prime site by the banks of the River Tweed.

In a hard hitting submission to the council - lodged after the multi-million pound deal was concluded last December - representatives of an adjacent property owner claim the proposals to use Lowood for residential development are flawed on multiple fronts.

Consultants Jones Lang Lasalle [JLL] acting for Middlemede Properties (MPL), owners of the Upper Pavilion salmon fishing beat next to Lowood, had presented a comprehensive response to the so-called Tweedbank Masterplan in March last year. But its assessment of the Lowood housing aspect of the plan was completely ignored by SBC. According to the local authority the 64-page document was not received in time and so was not shown to elected councillors.

It has now been revealed that JLL sent the council a second report in January 2019 in response to the Main Issues Report (MIR) of the Borders Local Development Plan Two (LDP2). The seven-page submission reinforces Middlemede's case for the housing developments at Lowood to be abandoned.

David Bell, director and head of planning at JLL, says in the report: "It should be noted that within the formal MIR/LDP process, MPL has made a number of representations to SBC with regard to what they consider is an inappropriate development approach to the Tweedbank housing allocation. As yet, disappointingly, there has been no response whatsoever from SBC to the important issues raised in that report."

The JLL document adds that MPL takes the view that the scale of development proposed at Tweedbank does not represent “the right development in the right place” and it cuts across the key objective of SBC – namely, to strike a balance between supporting sustainable growth and protecting the landscape and environment.

"The MIR sets out that LDP2 must incorporate a generous supply of housing land, but it acknowledges that there has been a limited annual completion rate for mainstream housing and limited take up of allocated housing sites", Mr Bell writes. 

"This illustrates some of the endemic housing market failure issues within the Scottish Borders and further underlines why sites such as Tweedbank, which clearly will have high abnormal costs to enable development, are likely to remain undeveloped and will not drive the sales values to deliver commercially viable development, high quality public realm and necessary environmental mitigation."

JLL also believe the reference to the Tweedbank site with regard to “excellent development opportunities” and being in an area “with a proven housing market demand” is misleading. 

"The housing market at this location faces extremely challenging issues which are likely to be a serious barrier to future development especially when considered against the expected development costs and relatively low values driven by housing development at this location."

The report declares: "Notwithstanding the fact that the Council seems to have purchased the Lowood Estate on an unconditional basis, there is, it is considered, strong justification for removing the allocation and pursuing more deliverable and effective housing land opportunities that can represent the right development in the right place in line with the Council’s overarching aims and objectives."

NEXT: MORE FROM THE MIDDLEMEDE SUBMISSION