Sefton Park senior living set for green light
Housing association Sanctuary has proposed 42 homes for over-55s close to the Liverpool park, while the redevelopment of Mossley Hill’s former Royal British Legion will also be determined next week.
Sanctuary intends to build a 26-apartment block, with two rows of news houses offering a further 16 homes at Sefton Park Care Village.
The site is occupied by two former care home buildings, Bishops Court and Greenheys Lodge, for which permission to demolish was granted last summer.
The 1.47-acre site makes up the care village along with the adjacent Arundel Park nursing home, to which Sanctuary owns the freehold.
Liverpool City Council’s planning committee will consider the application at its meeting on 6 July, with a recommendation to approve.
Architect Brock Carmichael has designed the scheme. It said that the existing landscape and tree canopy along the north, south and west boundaries would be retained.
The main block would front Sefton Park Road, with vehicular access to the side leading to parking, landscaping and the two rows of mews houses behind.
On the north-east corner of the site, Sanctuary owns and operates Sefton Park Gardens, a former office building converted to apartments and townhouses, as affordable rental housing. The site is allocated for housing in Liverpool’s unitary development plan, and is a later addition to the Princes Park conservation area.
Before becoming part of the care village, the site was occupied up to around 1987 by Liverpool College upper school, a boys-only sixth form.
Also recommended for approval is a reworking of a previously refused project. This is a hybrid application for the development of Crawford House, a former Royal British Legion building on Rose Lane, Mossley Hill.
The applicant Doug McQueen, advised by Roman Summer, is seeking outline consent to build two blocks of five apartments each at the rear of the site on a former bowling green; and full consent to carry out partial demolition to the side of the building in a redevelopment scheme resulting in eight further apartments.
Consent was refused and then dismissed on appeal in 2020 for the redevelopment element along with 14 new-build apartments. The make-up of the reworked scheme is 11 one-bed apartments amd seven two-bed. A “living wall” has been introduced on an adjacent works.
Ward councillor Cllr Andrew Makinson has objected, citing access issues, concerns over overlooking – which the applicant insists has been addressed since the 2020 refusal – and the loss of a well-used facility in the bowling green. Fifteen further objections have been lodged.
The professional team also includes architect the Ratcliffe Groves Partnership, Highways Advice, Rachel Hacking Ecology and Thomasons.
The Royal British Legion building fronts Rose Lane, at the bottom of the shot. Image from RGP
