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Les Charrières Country Hotel in St Peter is to be demolished after plans to convert it into a residential care home with 50 bedrooms have been approved by the Planning Committee.
Set in a 1600s farmhouse, Les Charrières Hotel closed down over three years ago and its owners received planning permission to build nine homes on the site - but the accommodation wasn’t built.
The redevelopment of the site includes the demolition of all existing structures. This will pave the way for the construction of the care home and its 50 bedrooms. The developers behind the project, LV Charrières Limited, have also included landscaped areas and will be widening surrounding roads to facilitate access to the site. 21 parking spaces will be available for the use of staff and visitors.
The proposed care home has been designed to be smaller in size than the hotel, going from 2,735sqm to 2,340 sqm, in order to reduce the building footprint, its scale and mass.
To reduce the impact of increased vehicular access in the area, which is accessed by narrow, winding roads, the developers suggested the purchase of a minibus. It would be used to pick up staff from a designated location in St Helier and drop them off at the care home.
Pictured: The former Les Charrieres Hotel in St Peter.
While the hotel is in the Green Zone, where no development is allowed without exceptional reasons, planning policy allows the redevelopment of existing buildings which provide employment opportunities, as long as the new building also provides jobs and "achieves significant environmental gains."
A neighbour living in the area spoke up against the application saying she was concerned about the increased traffic, although she stated she was in favour of the development of the site in principle. She added that having seen twice the fire service unable to bring a large truck to her property due to the roads being narrow, she was concerned about the use of a minibus and the likely need for ambulances or large vehicles.
Ian McDonald, Director at Axis Mason, the architects working on the project, said: "This proposal is bringing in new employment and significant environmental and landscape improvement. (...) The development 50 modern, future-proofed, bed spaces is exactly what the Sates require."
The development was given approval by all four members sitting on the committee with Deputy Jeremy Macon noting: "It is in the benefits of the community. (...) I welcome the project, encourage it and approve it."
Nick Bettany, Director, LV Care Group, said: “We are delighted to have received Planning approval for Les Charrières Residential & Nursing Home. The building has been left derelict for some time, so our project will provide significant improvements and environmental gains for the area.
"We have used local architects to deliver a sympathetic design in a vernacular country house style and the property will house 50 bedrooms. All rooms will be delivered to the highest modern standards and dually registered for nursing and high need residential clients. The home will also provide jobs for approximately 50 staff. LV Care Group is a Jersey owned and managed company. We are pioneering the development of the highest quality, technologically enabled homes that are unsurpassed in the Island and we are really pleased to be able to move forward with this significant Les Charrieres regeneration project.”
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