Councillors back Nicholsons Centre rebuild with car park funding condition

Councillors have unanimously approved the £500million Nicholsons Centre redevelopment – but only if the developer contributes to bringing Maidenhead’s car parks back to a ‘safe standard’.

Worries over parking in the shopping centre rebuild have been a key hurdle for Areli’s plan for the new Nicholson Quarter, which would see hundreds of flats as well as retail spaces built.

Councillors had deferred a final decision at a crunch meeting in September, citing a need for the developer to give more information on how its parking figures aligned.

Areli applied to demolish and rebuild the Nicholsons Centre with shops, flats and a new car park and public spaces back in 2020, with initial permission being granted in 2021.

An updated application submitted earlier this year, sought to build 856 residential units, a multi-storey car park with 452 spaces, retail and green spaces.

In September, councillors asked for more details around car parking, fire safety provisions, and the reduction in retail spaces.

A meeting in Maidenhead Town Hall last night (Thursday) heard that fire safety is adequate, with dual staircases to be installed and evacuation routes for each dwelling.

New conditions to provide public toilets as part of the scheme, a construction environmental management plan and an events programme for the Nicholsons Centre were also included.

The plans would deliver 55 retail units compared to the existing 60 units.

Addressing the meeting from the public gallery, resident Andrew Ingram said: “I think we need to look forward, we just don’t shop like we used to.

“I was shocked to learn how underused the car parks [in Maidenhead] were … but I still think [the scheme] could work.”

However, councillors questioned the amount of car parking. Only around 100 spaces will be made available for shoppers.

Areli completed a parking survey and found that over 55 per cent of the overall town centre car parking capacity is available during peak times.

But Councillor Kashmir Singh (Ind, Riverside) said that people will not use car parks like Stafferton Way and Vicus Way due to safety concerns.

Cllr K Singh added: “My real fear – not just concern – is that Maidenhead is going to become a dormitory, it’s not going to be an extra destination for retail.”

Cllr Jack Douglas (Lib Dem, St Mary’s) said that a section 106 should be agreed with Areli, whereby the developer would pay to help bring Maidenhead’s car parks ‘up to a safe standard’.

Cllr Douglas said: “[The scheme] is removing a large amount of street parking that’s going to spill over into our car parks. We all know these car parks have issues.

“There are broken lifts, fire door problems, flooding, bad lighting. Maybe a couple of million of essential works that need doing.”

He said a £600,000 contribution would be ‘reasonable’ and ‘necessary’. Money would be spent on improving Stafferton Way, Vicus Way and Hines Meadow car parks.

Cllr Gurch Singh (Lib Dem, St Mary’s) agreed and said that £600,000 would be a ‘fair share’.

Cllr Helen Taylor (Ind, Oldfield) said: “Our town centre is there for the foreseeable and we need to make sure that parking is available wherever that is going to be and we need to know how well our car parks are going to hold up.”

She said she was ‘particularly irked’ that the information requested in September has not been forthcoming on what the issues actually are with the existing Maidenhead car parks.

But, Adrien Waite, the council’s assistant director of planning, said that after officers also looked into the car parks, the necessary contribution would be around £250,000.

He said that the contribution would be between £250,000 and £600,000, but that this would need to be discussed ‘behind the scenes’ with the applicant before the final amount is decided.

James Cross, the council’s project team leader, reassured councillors that if they were ‘not satisfied’ with the amount, the application would come before them again at the next planning committee meeting.

Ultimately, councillors approved the proposal, but only if an agreement for the car park improvements is also reached.

A string of other conditions includes the use of varied building materials, CCTV, landscaping and public art displays during the construction period.