Horseworld's £5m expansion: Visitor centre funded by 90 new homes
ONE of Bristol's oldest charities is hoping to fund an ambitious new £5-million visitor centre by selling off green belt land for housing.
HorseWorld, which has its home close to Whitchurch village, has seen visitor numbers soar in recent years.
In order to cope with the growing demand it is hoping to build a visitor centre to expand the attraction.
The scheme includes new car parking and a new restaurant with views over the surrounding countryside.
Business Cards From Only £10.95 Delivered www.myprint-247.co.uk
View detailsOur heavyweight cards have FREE UV silk coating, FREE next day delivery & VAT included. Choose from 1000's of pre-designed templates or upload your own artwork. Orders dispatched within 24hrs.
Terms: Visit our site for more products: Business Cards, Compliment Slips, Letterheads, Leaflets, Postcards, Posters & much more. All items are free next day delivery. www.myprint-247.co.uk
Contact: 01858 468192
Valid until: Wednesday, May 22 2013
But in order to fund the ambitious project it is looking to sell off five acres of its land to developers.
The scheme, which includes mostly houses, would see about 90 new homes built on green belt land.
Bosses at the charity have been talking to planning bosses at Bath and North East Somerset Council, which is the planning authority for the area. If all goes to plan an application will go before the council next spring or early in the summer.
Although the charity has seen visitor numbers reach the 100,000 mark in recent years, making it one of the most popular attractions in the area, donations have been falling as a result of recession.
The expansion should mean that the charity, which cares for abandoned horses, would become financially stable. HorseWorld is currently celebrating its 60th anniversary and the plan is to mark the birthday with the expansion.
The charity said the popularity of the Whitchurch-based centre has meant at busy times such as school holidays people had been turned away.
HorseWorld owns 180 acres of land and the plans will include the new visitor centre, a covered equestrian training and display space, museum, and educational classroom area.
There are also plans for new car parks and improvements to the access road. A key part of the proposals would see large areas of green space being opened up to enable visitors to enjoy breathtaking views and see some 120 horses, ponies and donkeys in their natural environment.
A spokesman said: "Visitor numbers could comfortably rise to 134,000, which would generate enough income to replace the fall in donations - enough to secure its financial future. But the current visitor centre cannot grow.
"Having pursued all other funding avenues over a period of years, HorseWorld's only viable choice is to build a new visitor centre on the charity's land on the edge of Whitchurch.
"To fund the construction, HorseWorld also needs to secure planning permission to redevelop the site of its existing visitor centre with an anticipated 80 to 90 new homes, including the complete refurbishment of its listed buildings into homes. The capital raised through the development would finance the new centre."
The charity held a competition to find the best scheme, won by Bath- based architects Stubbs Rich, and the firm has drawn up early designs.
The RSPCA is supporting the project and Chief Inspector John Atkinson said: "When people see HorseWorld's rescue, rehab and rehoming work close up, they are often deeply moved. The proposed centre would allow visitors to get much closer to what this excellent charity does. In turn this would play an important role in educating people about responsible animal ownership, which we would expect to then lead to a reduction in neglect and mistreatment."
The charity plans to carry out a consultation with nearby residents before putting together its planning application.
The spokesman said: "As an important part of the community and the wider area we are very sensitive to neighbours' and friends' needs and wishes. So if we go ahead with a planning application for the housing and visitor centre – we will consult extensively and respectfully with those affected.
"We will carefully consider how we can design the proposals to benefit the local community and are very open-minded to the community helping shape our plans."
Comments
by pjbath
Friday, November 02 2012, 1:54PM
“I notice above comments do not take into consideration the land owners and why they are selling the land ? most of whom are farmers who have for generations been farming the land and are heartbroken at the thoughts of selling up due to the economy and have fought tooth and nail to keep the family home and they have known no other way of life but by selling some land can see a way forward, all I hear is 'it will not be a village' does this truly matter when our future generations need affordable housing , I feel so much for youngsters starting out today how can they ever think of owning a home ? none of us own a view and to keep horses alive and give people jobs in the area is far more important so GOOD LUCK HORSEWORLD with your expansion plans, put some life into Whitchurch and put it on the map there are plenty of fields out there.”
by Waybaloo
Thursday, November 01 2012, 4:23PM
“I got as far as
"..by selling off green belt land for housing."
and lost the will to continue.”
by PE175
Thursday, November 01 2012, 2:34PM
“I would suggest FromMendip that you get looking at a bit of Google earth or similar.
I think you will find that Stockwood although now being part of Bristol is well detatched by a nice Green Belt around it as is Whitchurch Village, people like Stockwood Pete are doing their best to keep it that way, its the loss of that green that should be resisted.
As for the daft and covenient word Nimby,Whitchurch most definetely is not in my backyard.
And to finish there were many complaints and objections concering the loss of land towards Whitchurch from Bristol in the 30,s, the compulsory purchase of Court farm,Pottery,Pidgeonhouse farm the Laurels and others were well complained about.
Nothing has changed just eating up fields and Villages to satisfy the likes of you has always been resisted and long may it continue that way.
People have to live somewhere and expansion will always occure but you make sure that it is done in a controlled and sensible manner.”
by PJ1979
Thursday, November 01 2012, 1:28PM
“@FromMendip
Well said”
by FromMendip
Thursday, November 01 2012, 11:17AM
“...............or even bourgeoisie”
by FromMendip
Thursday, November 01 2012, 11:15AM
“Trying to join Stockwood to Bristol? It's already in Bristol!!
A huge area of Whitchurch built in the 1970s is also in Bristol. It's only the 'village' part that remains in B&NES and Whitchurch Village is already physically joined to the Bristol part of Whitchurch housing estates.
Good job we didn't have these nimbys in the 1920s and 30s or Bristol's southern boundary would be around Red Lion Hill at Knowle. Where would the residents of south of this point now be living if new houses hadn't been built into what would have been the green belt if it had existed pre-war? In two up-two down hovels down squeezed into the old city areas?
At least the Radio Bristol morning traffic woman does her best to keep the city proletariat away from the county boureosie every weekday morning by telling us that the stretch of the A4 between Hicks Gate and Emery Road is in Keynsham. I wonder if St Brendan's College and the Bath Road Park and Ride know they are no longer in Bristol.
Nor by the way is Shirehampton according to Darvell or however he spells his name, another Radio Bristol luminary. He said it's near Bristol. Where is it then? In North Somerset? South Gloucestershire? Gwent? The people of Shire must be paying their taxes to Bristol City Council under false pretences if they aren't in Bristol.
Nimbys are really snobs. Many have to moved to villages which have been greatly expanded in the past to accommodate them, almost always onto what was once green belt. Now they're all right, Jack, they don't want any more expansion, and they certainly don't want those nasty city people living anywhere near them.
Good luck to Horseworld in its endeavours.”
by PE175
Thursday, November 01 2012, 9:50AM
“Horse World brilliant charity, Whitchurch nice place, just.
Whitchurch village will retain it identity as long as it stops the Bristol creep.
So in the Horse Worlds statement there is one fault "Green Belt land".
For some reason the mention of Green Belt now seems to mean development land if we can flog it.
Green Belt is what it states, Green Belt to seperate out Communities and Suburbs so that they retain some of their original identity, not to disappear into a mess like Brislington.
So Horse World that is recognised as being in Whitchurch now want to continue the gradual destruction of Whitchurch by erroding the Green Belt, there have been many in recent years trying to join Stockwood,Keynsham,Whitchurch and Bristol together the same with Long Ashton, flog of the Green Belt for their own self interests.
It dosn`t matter if Horse World is a charity or a Developer the end result is the same less Green Belt more concrete.
Horse World obviously puts its own success above that of keeping Whitchurch as a Village.”