Plans for a £6 million youth centre in Brighton have been put on hold so that councillors can make a formal visit to the site.
Labour councillor Jacob Allen asked Brighton and Hove City Council’s Planning Committee to defer a decision on the scheme until the next meeting in about a month’s time.
At a meeting yesterday afternoon (Wednesday 7 February) he said that a site visit would give members a better understanding of the planning application.
Councillor Allen said that he had visited the current youth centre building, at 64 Edward Street, Brighton, and walked around the outside.
But he wants to have a better idea of how the proposed building will “absorb” the current space through an “accompanied site visit”.
He said: “I felt I needed a bit more of an in-depth look, comparing the plans to the site, confirming where the site boundary is and what parking is being absorbed by the new development.
“I think it would be beneficial to the decision-making for this application.”
Fellow Labour councillor Joy Robinson backed the call for a site visit for the reasons outlined by Councillor Allen.
If approved, the new purpose-built youth centre would include shared exhibition, performance and workshop spaces, along with a skate park, climbing wall and sports hall.
Under the plans, the existing 1950s building, which is up to four storeys high, would be knocked down to make way for a five-storey replacement.
The council agreed last July to put £2.3 million towards the cost of the project while it has also been awarded a £4.3 million grant from the Department for Culture, Media and Sport’s Youth Investment Fund.
The overall cost of the project was expected to be £6.2 million, with a contingency of £400,000 built-in because labour and construction costs were continuing to rise.
The proposed building would be made from concrete and aluminium with metal panelling, with the entrance on the corner of Edward Street and Grosvenor Street.
Four objections have been sent to the council and one letter of support. Concerns include extra traffic, loss of on-site parking, over-development and the effect on the East Cliff Conservation Area.
The next meeting of the council’s Planning Committee is due to start at 2pm on Wednesday 6 March at Hove Town Hall. The meeting is scheduled to be webcast on the council’s website.
I would ask the councillor to also consider the projects accessibility to young people, as there are next to no free activities in there, potentially being quite prohibitive based on local socioeconomic demographics.
I totally agree with your comment. Sadly I don’t know of one single child from any of the surrounding buildings who attend the BYC despite being right on the doorstep. The surrounding children are excluded from participating purely for cost reasons. I can’t Imagine watching endless children being dropped off on a Saturday morning getting out of fancy cars with various instruments for guitar lessons etc but not being able to step foot in the building and participate due to lack of parents barely being able to provide food let alone heat. I’ve spoken to these families directly you are totally correct. Zero positive engagement happens between BYC and the surrounding social housing which causes an even bigger class divide in our city.
It’s a bit of a blind spot for me, I’m not aware of community assets nearby there. Think the closest is St George’s or Belta?
Why are all these new swimming pools and a youth centre priced at £6m each?
Why would a youth centre with no swimming pool cost £6m? Surely it would be far cheaper to convert
or refurbish an existing building for a new youth centre.
Why so ugly?
I strongly urge the site visit to take place in the day and at night in good weather when up to 20-30 children gather in the carpark drinking, screaming and have even tried lighting fires! Setting light to mopeds and benches.This area is plagued with anti social behaviour and because it’s surrounded by mainly social housing a sense of lawlessness is just to be tolerated which is so unfair to residents. We have had fires directly started underneath Tyson building which could have easily been another Grenfell. I could produced endless photographic evidence.This building needs to be of the highest noise reducing standard to contain endless drumming lessons and slamming skateboards within the building. Outdoor space must be of a minimum to discouraged the overspill of crowds sadly. For that cost it should be a building to be proud of which offers a place of safety for our children not where people openly drug deal to children in the car park and older guys try to pick up very young girls. Parents really need to be aware of what goes on here. The tiny amount of staff which currently exists have zero control on this place especially in the carpark!