At their meeting on 6th March, Development Control A Committee, chaired by Councillor Eddy, backed the proposals and resolved to delegate approval to officers, subject to the removal of outstanding concerns including from the Health and Safety Executive about fire safety and completion of a s106 agreement.
We submitted a Public Forum Statement (available below) on the required one side of A4 summarising the detailed concerns we’d raised over several representations. Some of our members spoke in the Public Forum.
Needless to say the committee’s decision is very disappointing. Even more so, because, in our opinion, the decision was made on the basis of an officer’s report that played-up the limited benefits and downplayed the adverse impacts. The report didn’t say what the council’s own conservation team thought and concerns about fire safety raised by HSE five months ago only came to light on the eve of the committee. Written differently, other councillors may have joined the committee members from the Green Party who voted against the proposals.
Historic England had strong objections but, because they fell foul of a council rule, didn’t get to speak to the committee, notwithstanding there were contributions from the developer’s team. Rebecca Barrett’s (South West regional director at Historic England) opinion piece in B24/7 gives a flavour of their concerns.
Bristol Civic Society’s Public Forum Statement.
Previous posts on Premier Inn proposals: Feb 2024, Jan 2024, Aug 2023, June 2023.
Does the Fire Service possess apparatus capable of rescuing occupants from the top floor of the proposed building?
The granting of this permission will rate among the most brutal acts of self-harm that Bristol has carried out since WW2. It marks us as a mediocre city, one entirely unfit to hold the title Green Capital City. Your own comments go to the point: ‘It makes for a claustrophobic, brutalist city that has lost touch with human scale. The huge carbon load of these proposals sits uncomfortably with Bristol’s ambition to be carbon-neutral by 2030.’
Given the enormity of this crassness, covering the plan itself and the planning process behind its promotion, might the Civic Society do two things: resolve to fight this battle on a wider-than-usual front AND support the campaign to expose Bristol’s planning system for what it is.
Our citizens have their minds elsewhere. I can think of barely a soul who would not object to this plan. They need to be awakened, for this monster is to be created under their noses.
Cllr Eddy’s role in these ghastly wounds to the city’s fabric and soul needs to be investigated.