A dated shopping precinct in Tilehurst remains unchanged despite major redevelopment being approved more than a year and a half ago.
The Meadway Shopping Centre in Honey End Lane, Tilehurst, is home to a number of shops, businesses and takeaways with flats situated above the four buildings that make up the precinct.
The owners of the centre, Chillingham Limited, gained conditional approval from Reading Borough Council to redevelop the precinct with a new shopping space and 258 homes to replace the flats that would be lost.
However, no work on replacing the buildings has been undertaken 19 months after plans were approved.
The go-ahead was conditional on Chillingham and the council arriving at a section 106 legal agreement, which involves negotiations around how much the developer would pay the council in community contributions.
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A recommendation made by council planning officer Steve Vigar stated that if the legal agreement is not completed by November 30, 2021, powers should be delegated to the council’s head of planning, development and regulatory services to refuse the application.
Yet more than 18 months on the S106 agreement has not been completed, and the plan has not been refused either.
When asked for a clarifying statement, a council a spokesperson said that there is no update on the project other than that discussions on the S106 are ongoing.
You can view the application by typing reference 191496 into the council’s planning portal.
It was given conditional approval at meeting of the council’s planning committee on October 6, 2021.
At the time, councillor Jo Lovelock (Labour, Norcot) said: “Overall this precinct is so in need of an upgrade. It’s been looking sad and tired for a very long time.
“I welcome it, and hope that the applicants actually will build it out.”
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Cllr John Ennis (Labour, Southcote) added: “I thought it looked tired and worn out when it was first built to be honest with you!”
However, he did acknowledge that the precinct was well used when it had ‘a good array of shops’.
The plan was only given conditional approval on outline at that meeting, meaning reserved matters relating to the appearance, landscaping, layout and scale of the project will have to be the subject of future applications.
The Meadway centre was identified for development in the Reading Local Plan adopted in November 2019, in policy Wr3o.
The policy states any development should be ‘as comprehensive as possible’ and that no homes should be lost.
A previous plan to redevelop the precinct, application 150945, which was also submitted by Chillingham, was approved on June 29, 2017, but never enacted.
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