Reading planning roundup - listed school building works and flats

Council submits plans for listed school building restoration

PICTURED: Katesgrove Primary School

First up, we have a new planning application, which has gone live on the Reading Borough Council (RBC) planning portal this week, for repairs at a listed school building in Katesgrove.

READ MORE: The house-building college in Reading making sure kids don’t fall through the cracks

RBC has submitted plans itself for works at the Simmonds Building at Katesgrove Primary School.

The works include repairs and improves to windows which the council says will improve access to natural ventilation in rooms where windows currently cannot be opened.

Previously known as the Henry Building, it was built in 1873 to designs by Joseph Morris, and extended in 1891 and 1902.

It is listed at Grade II for the following principal reasons:

• Architectural interest: a striking and idiosyncratic design by the leading local architect of the mid-19th
• Historic interest: one of the first pair of schools to be developed by the Reading School Board, and one of the earliest outside London.
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The council is seeking listed building consent for the following works:

• Repairs and redecoration of timber windows and external woodwork, installation of draught seals and mechanical operating gear to opening casements.
• Alterations to suspended ceilings to expose currently partially concealed inside face of some windows.
• Brickwork repairs and areas of re-pointing.
• Refurbishment and partial replacement of defective cast iron rain-water goods and replacement of plastic sections of down pipe.
• Change colour of rainwater goods and cast iron wall grilles from white to black.

RBC says the proposed works are “essentially repairs to existing fabric and there are no proposed changes to the internal arrangement of the building”.

Plans to turn Broad Street Mall offices into dozens of flats approved

PICTURED: Fountain House, Broad Street Mall

Next up, more flats in the town centre have been approved.

Offices at Reading’s Broad Street Mall will be converted into 48 flats, adding to plans to build 422 flats above the shopping centre.

Plans from owners Inception Reading SARL to convert most of Fountain House, 2 Queens Walk, which looms above Broad Street Mall, into 48 apartments, were approved by the council on Monday, September 13.

READ MORE: Plans to turn Broad Street Mall offices into dozens of flats approved

The basement, ground, first, second, fourth, fifth, sixth, seventh and eighth floors of Fountain House will change from offices to flats.

There will be a mix of one, two and three-bed flats, 30 secure and covered cycle parking spaces and 20 additional parking spaces provided at basement level which can be used by visitors to the site and tenants of the University of West London, who will continue to occupy floors three, nine and 10.

Flats plan above nightclub refused

PICTURED: The offices above Q-Club

Finally, plans to convert offices above a nightclub and bar on Friar Street into flats have been refused due to concerns about noise.

County House, 17 Friar Street, is above Q-Club and Pitcher and Piano in the town centre.

BAE Systems Pension Fund Trustees Ltd submitted plans in July to convert the County House offices into 23 flats.

READ MORE: Flats plan above Q-Club refused after developers carry out noise test during lockdown

But the plans have been refused by Reading Borough Council (RBC) planning officers, who said the developer had “failed to demonstrate that future occupiers of the development would not be adversely impacted by commercial noise”.

The applicant conducted a noise survey between July 2 and 5, 2021, and plans to prevent noise from adversely impacting future tenants.

However, at this time bars and restaurants were operating at reduced capacity due to social distancing rules to help manage the Covid-19 pandemic and nightclubs were not permitted to open until July 19.