New Forest Bridge School to be built at site of Maidenhead Target Shooting Club

An application to build a special needs school at the site of Maidenhead Target Shooting Club was unanimously voted through by councillors last week.

Forest Bridge School is currently based in Chiltern Road at the former home of Oldfield School and has 65 pupils with autism.

The application for the new school building was heard at the Maidenhead Area Development Management Panel at Maidenhead Town Hall on Wednesday, June 19.

Permission is for a part- single and part two-storey building, ancillary multi-use games areas, landscaping and parking to accommodate 96 pupils.

The development would be in the greenbelt, but councillors were told officers had deemed there to be ‘very special circumstances’ for the build given the educational need for this type of school and a lack of alternative sites.

Speaking for the application was Mike Ibbott from planning company TP Bennett.

He said: “The joint autism strategy for your area, published by your council, shows there’s a need for something like 500 additional SEN places of this kind by next year and rising beyond that.”

He also said ‘the design of the building has been very much geared towards minimising the impact of the openness of this part of the green belt’.

Cllr Geoff Hill (The Borough First, Oldfield) said although he does ‘have concerns about the entrance and the access to the site’, it is a good application and ‘has substantial merits because we need the facility’.

Cllr Phil Haseler (Con, Cox Green) said: “I’m the first to protect the greenbelt against inappropriate development.

“However, the site is very small, the school is for less than a hundred to start with, it’s alongside the huge Magnet [Braywick] Leisure Centre, my observations are that the impact on the openness of the greenbelt is very limited –  weighed up against the benefit.”

He added: “I accept there’s harm to greenbelt but it’s far outweighed by the benefits given by this development.”

Speaking on Thursday, school headteacher Elizabeth Farnden said: “We are thrilled with the approval last night, which will mean we are able to move to our new site in

autumn 2020.

“This means we can meet the needs of 96 pupils using ABA (applied behavioural analysis) to underpin their individualised curriculum.”