Brighton College has revealed plans for more redevelopment of its campus.
The private school says it needs to build more boarding houses so it doesn’t have to buy up family homes in the areas and convert those instead.
It is currently appealing the refusal of its plans to knock through three houses in Walpole Road and create a 27-bed boarding house.
And any plans for similar developments in the future were made more difficult in January when the council approved planning guidelines for the conservation area which stated the residential nature of the streets around the college are an important part of its character.
Now, it says it wants to knock down its existing nursery school at St Mary’s Hall, just east of the hospital, and build a new four-storey building which would accommodate children from nursery to year six.
The former convent in Walpole Road which currently houses the college’s primary-aged children would be converted into a boarding house, with a new building put up to replace 20th century extensions. The site would have bedspace for 150 teenage children and boarding staff.
The college has not submitted plans to the council, but has launched a consultation with residents and published details on a dedicated website.
The website says: “The placing of younger children in a very residential area causes significant drop-off congestion for neighbours, blocking streets morning and afternoon.
“In addition, our lack of boarding space means that we have needed to purchase and convert local houses for accommodation, causing understandable concern for neighbours about the housing stock.
“Converting the convent site to boarding removes the drop-off congestion issues immediately, ends the need to find additional houses and also hugely reduces pupil noise.”
It adds: “Over the last fifteen years, Brighton College has worked through a masterplan to redevelop its campus.
“In doing so, it has shown its commitment to implementing first-class architecture.
“We recognise this has been disruptive to our neighbours but we hope that the benefits are also clear (including use of the site by local primary schools; preserving previously endangered historic buildings, and replacing high energy and high carbon buildings with ones that are all at BREEAM excellent).”
The website, which went live last Friday at 5pm, asks for comments no later than this Sunday.
It says it intends on submitting a planning application early next year, and if approved quickly, to complete both builds by September 2027.
Good to see that paying VAT hasn’t stopped their ambitions
Because they have 10 years back dated VAT now to collect.
Despite reeves being advised that this will end up costing more than it makes she is determined to go through with it. Small schools that cater for special needs that the council is unable or unwilling to provide will go bust. Large expensive schools will work the VAT system to their advantage. A throwaway comment that got into a manifesto that does more harm than good. More to come no doubt.
It is one of the best schools in the country. All they will do is take fewer British kids from middle class families and instead take more rich overseas kids as the parents of these kids can afford and value one of the best educations in the UK. The Chinese won’t be so price sensitive. Nevermind, they can always go to one of the failing local schools.
On point. All those people who are happy about the 20% VAT can’t comprehend that it will do NOTHING to the wealthiest. ZERO. Instead, you will have more Russian and Chinese pupils. And all the UK hard-working, middle-class, but not crazy rich parents won’t have the opportunity to send their children to a good school (if that’s their priority/wish). It reminds me of chavs being initially very happy about Brexit. Oh, and do you think that extra money will transform public schools? I wish, but let’s wait and see.
Brighton College will get the VAT back on the capital expenditure, 20% rebate.
Both these building proposals are overbearing, change the nature of our community irrevocably and do nothing for local residents. They are merely a cash cow for this aggressive, expansionist business. That has charitable status.
The new building proposed on Walpole Road in the current proposal will be overbearing and out of keeping with the current site usage . Adding 150 teenage boarders on the Walpole Road site will create a significant imbalance to the surrounding residential roads.
I respectfully don’t believe it will be overbearing, personally. I don’t think thematically there’s a particular strong definition for the area to argue it is out of keeping.
Although I think the road structure around that junction specifically will need improvement; it is a bottleneck for traffic being quite narrow for a road that leads to A&E due to the on road parking, and the corner is well known to flood deeply in heavy rainfall. On that bit, I agree.
The site usage is currently for day classes. The proposal is to build a new building – 3 floors closer to Eastern Road and 2 floors closer to Belle Vue Gdns and Along with the existing building would house 140 + boarders. From a usage perspective – this changes significantly the definition of the site usage.
@Benjamin – I think the flooding occurs at the corner across the road from the Bingo Hall – which is one block down