PLANNING | St Helens signs off 800,000+ sq ft of warehouses

Omega West continues to grow, with Miller Developments securing planning permission for the next two large sheds. Meanwhile, Parr Stocks Fire Station is set to be demolished to make way for 40 homes.

The decisions were made by St Helens Council’s planning committee meeting on Tuesday.

Omega West Unit Two + Unit Three

The building of the next two units of its 184-acre Omega West industrial park can now proceed.

Omega West’s warehouses are part of planning permission granted in 2021 by the secretary of state. Omega West is the result of a partnership between Homes England, Miller Developments and KUC Properties and sits near Junction 8 of the M62,

Unit Two is the smaller of the two, coming in at 308,900 sq ft. Unit Three is 505,400 sq ft. Construction is already underway on Unit One – an 830,000 sq ft distribution centre for Home Bargains.

Both Unit Two and Three are designed by Chetwoods Architects. They include offices, vehicle maintenance areas and a gatehouse. Planning permission includes necessary infrastructure works, such as the creation of internal access roads, cycle routes and more.

Unit Two will sit on nearly 20 acres of arable farmland located just south of the Home Bargains site. It has been designed to meet BREEAM Very Good standards and will be 18.5 metres tall.

There are two parking areas for the warehouse, a 40-space parking yard geared towards HGVs and a 310-space employee car park. The employee car park includes 18 accessible spaces, 60 cycle spaces and 20 motorcycle ones.

Unit Three is on a little more than 34 acres of land and will be accessed via Skyline Drive and Catalina Approach. It will sit just south of Unit Two with Whittle Brook to the west of the site.

Iceland has already claimed the 505,400 sq ft warehouse, which will be 19 metres tall. Unit Three will have an employee car park with 414 car spaces, including 25 accessible ones. There will also be spaces to store 96 cycles and 32 motorcycles.

The project teams for both applications include WSP and The Ecology Practice. Quod is the planning consultant.

The application reference number for Unit Two is P/2022/0091/RES. The number for Unit Three is P/2022/0202/RES.

Lawrenson Associates designed the scheme. Credit: via planning documents

Parr Stocks Fire Station

Gradan Homes can progress its plans to demolish the St Helens Community Fire Station off Parr Stocks Road after getting planning approval from the council.

The fire department that used to reside at the station relocated to a newer facility off Violet Way in October 2020. The site was then used as a Covid testing centre until the end of January 2021. Since then, it has been vacant.

Gradan Homes worked with Lawrenson Associates to draw up plans to turn the site into 40 houses and flats. As part of the approved proposals, the fire station and its training tower and outbuildings will be demolished.

The housing development will feature six two-bedroom and 11 one-bedroom flats across three apartment blocks. The remaining 23 dwellings will be a mix of semi-detached and detached houses.

Specifically, there will be 12 semi-detached three-bedroom homes, six semi-detached four-bedroom ones, three detached three-bed houses, and two semi-detached five-bedroom ones. Because the project benefits from a vacant building credit it will not offer any affordable housing.

The application’s reference number is P/2021/0263/FUL.