Council changes condition requiring developer to build new canal bridge

Twm Owen, local democracy reporter

Councillors have agreed to change a condition that required a bridge to be built over the Monmouthshire and Brecon Canal as part of a new housing development.

House builder Taylor Wimpey was supposed to have built a new bridge, just north of Five Locks Close in Pontnewydd, Cwmbran by the time the 650th house of its giant 1,200 home development at South Sebastopol was occupied.

Torfaen Borough Council’s planning committee was told residents moved into the 650th home at the end of 2022, meaning work on the bridge should have begun in 2021.

Financial uncertainty

But council planning consultant Duncan Smith said that hadn’t happened with the firm blaming financial uncertainty, slow sales and staff being furloughed during the Covid pandemic for the delay.

The committee was asked to change the condition so that bridge, which still requires planning permission and is expected to take up to 18 months to build, is completed by the 850th occupation.

Mr Smith said 700 homes are already occupied and told councillors: “They are in breach with 50 more built than essentially should have been.”

The Wren’s Nest phase of the development on the eastern side of the canal is currently under construction while there is no planning permission yet in place for the Maes Gwyn site, on the western side of the canal. The bridge will connect the two phases.

A northern bridge, linking other phases of the developments, is already in place but it can serve no more than 371 houses, on the western side of the canal.

There are already 135 completed at Hanbury Lock, eight in the village core that are being developed and 228 at Barcud Coch and Uplands also under development.

Ring road

The second bridge is required to complete a ring road serving the whole of the South Sebastopol development and it will also link the Barcud Coch and Maes Gwyn phases.

A construction traffic management plan will be required as a condition of the permission of the variation to the planning permission.

Upper Cwmbran Labour member Steve Evans said he “couldn’t get his head round” why the condition, made in 2015, hadn’t been complied with.

Mr Smith said he couldn’t speak for the developer but said it had given its explanation and said Covid “had an effect on the whole country never mind this site.”

Pontnewydd Labour councillor Stuart Ashley said there had been “a lot of interest” in the impact on the canal cycle path and Mr Smith said comments submitted about construction of the bridge will be transferred to that application and reported to the committee when it is considered.

New Inn Labour councillor Jon James described the debate as “academic” and said the committee should approve the application, in line with the recommendation, and it was approved unanimously.