Somerset planning: Students’ sculpture to get permanent home

A permanent home for a statue by Weston-super-Mare students inspired by the Knife Angel, knocking through a wall in Bath’s iconic Royal Crescent, and putting solar panels on a major leisure centre are among the schemes people are trying to get planning permission for in Bath and North East Somerset and North Somerset.

Every week, the two neighbouring unitary authorities receive hundreds of planning applications and we have selected some of the most interesting proposals.

All planning applications are available for public inspection on the respective council’s website. Most plans will be decided by council planning officers, but some of the most significant or contentious will go before the councils’ planning committee.

Planning committees are made up of elected councillors but decisions should be decided based on the council’s planning policies, not local politics — although it doesn’t always turn out that way.

Students’ knife crime sculpture to find permanent home on the Bournville

A sculpture created by Weston-super-Mare students inspired by the Knife Angel is set to find a permanent home on the Bournville.

Students from the Voyage Learning Campus created the “Beacon of Hope” in June in workshops at Alliance Homes’ Coleridge Road Community Garden, working with artists Felix Rowberry and Char Smith. The sculpture is intended to create a “meaningful legacy” after the Knife Angel — a statue made of 100,000 knives — visited the town in May.

The Beacon of Hope, a 4-and-a-half metre tall lighthouse sculpture, has been on display in the Sovereign Centre but it is now set to be installed on the Bournville. Alliance Homes have submitted a planning application to North Somerset Council to install in the central flower bed between the shops on St Andrews Parade, opposite the Healthy Living Centre.

In a statement submitted with the planning application, Alliance Homes community growth manager Helen Wheelock said: “We have engaged in discussions with residents in St Andrews Parade and regular visitors to the Healthy Living Centre about the beacon’s installation, and this area has emerged as the most popular location. We believe it will fit well within the raised bed and be visible from every angle.”

You can view and comment on the plans here.

Bid to expand front room in Royal Crescent flat

A flat in Bath ’s iconic Royal Crescent is looking to remove a wall to expand its front room.

Many houses in the Grade I listed building have been subdivided into flats since they were built in eighteenth century. In the second floor apartment at no. 24, alternations are being proposed to remove a wall between two bedrooms at the front of the property to create one large front room.

A heritage statement submitted with the application said: “Although the studwork partition between the two front rooms is lath and plaster it is not clear if it is part of the original fabric or a modification at a later stage.”

It is hoped to remove this wall to turn the two bedrooms into a single large living room, looking out the front of the property, and use the living room at the back as the bedroom instead.

You can view and comment on the plans here.

Plans go live for solar panels on North Somerset’s biggest leisure centre

306 solar panels could soon be installed across the roof of North Somerset’s biggest leisure centre.

A prior approval application has been submitted to install the panels across the roof of Hutton Moor Leisure Centre in Weston-super-Mare. The panels would generate an estimated peak output of 143.82kW.

North Somerset Council secured £270k of funding from Sport England’s Swimming Pool Support Fund in May to install solar panels on Hutton Moor Leisure Centre and on Portishead Open Air Pool. Installing the solar panels on Hutton Moor Leisure Centre was estimated at the time to save 28.17 tonnes of carbon per year.

You can view and comment on the plans here.

Repairs planned to beautiful historic shop opposite Bath Abbey

Located in Bath’s most picturesque spot, the Jody Cory goldsmiths is in a historic Georgian building on the Abbey Courtyard.

But the building is now in need of maintenance. Structural steelwork around the pavement windows is “corroded,” there is damp in the basement, deterioration of the stone facade, and the roof “is in need of general repair and maintenance.”

Now a planning application has been submitted to Bath and North East Somerset Council for repairs to the basement, roof, and facade, along with replacing the pavement lights and carrying out fire protection works.

A statement submitted with the planning application said: “The works would not alter the historic plan form and the building will be rejuvenated through repair. This will retain the evidential value and improve the aesthetic value that this building contributes to the UNESCO World Heritage Site and Bath Conservation Area.”

You can view and comment on the application here.