Eden's founder "dumfounded" by Torquay gardens plan

Campaign to 'Save Singleton Gardens'

Controversial Torquay building plans which left Eden Project founder Sir Tim Smit ‘dumbfounded’ will go before Torbay Council planners next week.

Residents near Singleton Gardens have mounted a high-profile campaign against the development, and bay MP Kevin Foster was among those at a public meeting on the site earlier this year.

Because planning officers say the benefits outweigh the drawbacks, the council’s planning committee will be recommended to approve the plan when they meet on Tuesday next week. There would be more than 20 stringent conditions imposed on the builders and a £65,000 levy for local projects.

The plans have so far attracted 164 letters of objection and 45 of support.

Applicant OJ Developments wants to build seven apartments and two houses on the walled garden site off the up-market Meadfoot Sea Road, plus extensions and refurbishments to an existing dwelling and landscaping work.

The Save Singleton Gardens Group has been raising money to buy the nineteenth century garden  site and turn it into a community market garden, as it has been in the past. The group has also applied to Historic England for the area to be registered as nationally important.

The group has also called for the area to be listed as an Asset of Community Value, which would help save it from development.

In a letter Sir Tim Smit, founder of the Eden Project in Cornwall, said he would be ‘dumbfounded’ if council members supported the application, meaning Torbay had ‘shot itself in the foot’ by betraying such a lack of cultural judgement.

However, OJ Developments says its new buildings would respond to modern needs without ‘slavishly replicating’ historic buildings nearby. The new homes would be low-carbon dwellings with electric vehicle charging points, garden spaces and terraces.

Historic England says Singleton Gardens is not historically and architecturally interesting enough to be listed.

The planning saga began in 2019 when developers made inquiries about building eight apartments there and planning officers raised questions about the bulk of the planned buildings.

In 2020 there was an inquiry about building six homes, and in 2021 an application was filed for nine apartments and two houses, which was refused in March this year for being ‘inappropriate’, ‘out of character’ and ‘of poor quality’.

Now officers say the latest plans offer a ‘positive design solution’ to the previous issues, although the Torquay Neighbourhood Forum disagrees.

Supporters say it would bring much-needed housing and make use of a neglected site.

Council officers say the development would help the bay deliver on its housing targets. A report to the committee says the harm done to the Lincombes Conservation Area is not enough to warrant refusal. It goes on: “It is concluded that the benefits outweigh the minor level of less than substantial harm caused.”