By Kit Sandeman, Local Democracy Reporter
More than 1,100 new student flats are expected to be built in the city across four different sites but one development could overlook Nottingham Crown Court.
Next week planning bosses at Nottingham City Council will vote on four different student accommodation schemes which would see the new flats built over the coming months.
The four schemes are on Station Street, Waterway Street West, Huntingdon Street and Gregory Street and all are expected to be approved.
The scheme on Station Street is on newly-vacant land next to the tram bridge where the old job centre was.
Developers are set to build 323 new student flats here with the building reaching nine storeys at its highest.
As well as flats the new development will include a gym, reception area and coffee shop.
Former railway arches would be redeveloped to incorporate street traders.
The Ministry of Justice (MoJ) has raised concerns about the development because part of the new building would overlook the Crown Court where some of the most serious court cases are heard.
The MoJ said this could cause issues in terms of the privacy of court hearings and there may be ‘unauthorised outlook from the development towards the court rooms’.
The MoJ’s submission to the council says: “The Crown Court holds various hearings and proceedings including high security criminal cases and as such there is need to ensure that the day to day operations of the court are not prejudiced.”
It has requested it be consulted on a construction management plan, along with the police, to ‘ensure that there are no adverse impacts on the court’.
The largest of the schemes in an unrelated development is a 12-storey building with 462 bedrooms on Waterway Street West near the Vat and Fiddle pub.
The building would range from five stories high to 12 storeys high but the Nottingham Civic Society has said is ‘far too tall’.
A spokesman said: “The height and massing of this development should be completely reconsidered as this development is wholly unsustainable and contrary to adopted council policy.”
Initial designs for the scheme included a ninth-storey terrace and bar but designers have now modified the scheme to remove the open-air element of the design.
However the application does include two new shops, sports and games areas and 220 secure cycle spaces.
A third development would see 301 new flats built in a eight-storey building on Huntingdon Street which would involve the demolition of a single-storey flat roofed furniture store.
Planning permission was granted for 86 flats on the site but developers have now come back and asked for additional permissions to be granted.
The city archaeologist has said supervision of construction will be needed due to the potential that there could be medieval remains.
The report says: “Being located only 80m from a known medieval burial ground and approximately 100m from an area of intense medieval pottery production, there is the potential that domestic and industrial activity took place within the site boundary.
“Indeed the site lay within the clayfields that are believed to have been associated with pottery production.
“It is therefore considered there is archaeological potential for this site for remains of medieval and post-medieval date.”
The fourth, smaller scheme is for 23 apartments on Gregory Street.
Four separate firms have put in the applications: Southern Grove Traffic Street Ltd for Waterway Street West; Vita Student Nottingham 1 Ltd for Station Street; Aspbury Planning Limited on behalf of Ms Rachel Warren for Huntingdon Street; and Zenith Planning and Design Alison Dudley on behalf of Mr Sajaid Mahmood for Gregory Street.
All four schemes have been recommended for approval and will be voted on at a meeting of Nottingham City Council’s planning committee on Wednesday (July 19).
