Hove landowner given more time to revamp trading estate

The owner of the Sackville Trading Estate in Hove has been given three more years to start work on overhauling the site.

Coal Pension Properties, which runs the old National Coal Board pension scheme for miners – has planning permission to build a supermarket, other shops and offices at the top of Sackville Road.

Permission to go ahead with the scheme was granted three years ago but was due to expire in March.

Brighton and Hove City Council said that the revamp could create 690 jobs.

The estimate includes 150 jobs in the food store, 150 in other shops, 350 office jobs, 30 in cafés and small shops and 10 in on-site management and security.

The scheme also includes some homes and an underground car park.

Councillor Christopher Hawtree, chairman of the council’s Planning Committee, said: “I am glad that there is still a commitment to such a development in these times and look forward to its progress.”

The campaign group Save Hove said recently that the developer, a company called P2, was unlikely to rebuild the site along the lines of the current planning permission.

It said that it wasn’t ready with new plans but wanted to keep its options open so decided to renew its existing planning permission before it ran out.

P2, it said, included the same key people who ran Parkridge, the developer which came up with the plans to revamp the site, which it wants to call Hove Place.

Save Hove said that Rayner, the optical lens maker which owns a site on the Sackville Trading Estate, had bought new premises in Worthing. But it wasn’t expected to move for a few years yet.

P2 may review its scheme in the meantime.