The plans are for the Dee Lane car park site (the beach car park) to be sold to developers for a hotel, some of the proceeds being used to rebuild the Sailing School - the whole package being referred to as the 'Sail'.
Plans by Carpenter Investments (see also more pictures at the foot of this page):
A draft (4.10.05) of the Council's development brief can be downloaded from www.wirral.gov.uk/Minute/Public/The%20Sail%20draft%20-%2005.10.05_17945.pdf, or from here.
September 2008
The summer 08 edition of Big Horizens (Wirral Council's investment newsletter) includes a section on the Sail (p5). See here.
It states "The Council's preferred developer Carpenter Investments recently undertook an extensive public consultation exercise and are now taking on board the feedback from the exhibition before moving forward with a planning application in 2009".
July 2008
Carpenter's Exhibition: See July 2nd Liverpool Post article here.
June 2008
Wirral Council Officers gave some details of the Consultation Process at the West Wirral Area Forum held in Hoylake on 11 June 2008.
Carpenter Investments mounted a public exhibition on 26th/27th/28th June 2008 in West Kirby Concourse. No explanation was given for the short notice of the details of the Consultation. There was a letter drop to CH48 residents, but not all received it. A website supporting the exhibition is at www.westkirbysail.co.uk.
The exhibition leaves a number of questions unanswered, and raises some more.
• What are the problems with the current sailing school?
• How much would they cost to repair (rather than demolish and rebuild)?
• What are the alternatives to the Carpenter Plan of a new hotel on the Dee Lane car park? There were four considered by the Cabinet when the Carpenter plan was selected. What were the other three plans and why was the Carpenters plan preferred?
• How many residents in CH48 actually received notification of the exhibition?
• How many people completed a feedback form?
• When did the feedback forms arrive at the exhibition? There were none available at the launch at 11am on 26th July - residents wanting to give feedback were told that the forms had not arrived from the printers.
The Councillors present at the Local Area Forum on 11 June 2008 expressed their disatisfaction that they had had no prior notice of the details of the Consultation. Cllr Hale urged that an impartial body should be involved in the Consultation Process. Cllr Hale had tried to make public the amount that Morrisons had paid for their adjacent land in an attempt to guage the value of the car park site, but both Morrisons and the Council refuse to publish this information. Cllr Hale did say, though, that the amount offered by Carpenters for the redevelopment of the Sailing School would represent a poor return for West Kirby in comparison.
There has been no mention of a public meeting at which questions could be asked.
The BBC Politics show on 15 June included an interview with Alan Beer. He stated "Providing that we receive some feedback that is positive and people are encouraged by what we do, we will be going for full planning later in the year."
See here for full interview
The Liverpool Daily Post carried an article on the plans on 21 June 2008 - see here
May 2008
After some delays in this process, the Liverpool Daily Post reported on 1 May that Hilbre High School students will shortly be consulted by Carpenter Investments - see here
West Kirby was featured in a Times property column on 2nd May - see Times article. This include the rather depressing statement "There are, of course, residents who object to regeneration plans ..." as if healthy debate of the pros and cons is not welcome.
February 2008
Some further details of the regeneration plans were revealed by Wirral Council Officers at the Local Area Forum held in West Kirby on 19 February 2008.
Carpenter Investments will be developing its plans and presenting them to West Kirby residents in the summer. It is understood to have a 12 month 'lock-out' agreement, ending in Jan. 2009. Within this time it must present plans and prove adequate consultation with residents.
The feeling of the meeting was overwhelmingly against the proposals on a show of hands.
Residents from West Kirby and Hoylake were told that the developer would be undertaking public consultation in the summer of 2008. There was much concern that the developer would be setting the questions and would not be fair in presenting a summary of the responses. Residents asked for an independent assessment of their views (such as from an independent reputable market research company) but this was not forthcoming from the Council Officers.
It was announced that the Council would be organising a further public meeting in West Kirby at the end of March when further discussion would take place.
Jan 2008
Proposals to build the four-storey £10M hotel on the West Kirby Dee Lane car park site were announced by Carpenter Investments Ltd (www.carpenterinvestments.co.uk) in January 2008. On their website they describe the hotel as "a first class boutique style hotel together with associated spa, dining and new retail facilities". The company will be developing its plans and presenting them to West Kirby residents in the summer.
More can be read about it on Wirral Council's investment website
Pictures
More pictures from the Egret West website (www.egretwest.com):
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