Thetford garage areas set for homes

Three areas of rundown garages and parking are set to be transformed as part of the regeneration of two Thetford housing estates. Breckland Council's cabinet agreed yesterday that the large garage forecourt areas should be handed over to Peddars Way Housing Association to be turned into homes and parking.

Three areas of rundown garages and parking are set to be transformed as part of the regeneration of two Thetford housing estates.

Breckland Council's cabinet agreed yesterday that the large garage forecourt areas should be handed over to Peddars Way Housing Association to be turned into homes and parking.

The areas are underused, attract anti-social behaviour and new parking areas are needed closer to people's homes, the council says.

While they are being handed over at no cost, the value of the land, at £56,000 each, is to be ringfenced in a fund to be reinvested in the estates on which they sit.

The sites include land at Ash Close on the Barnham Cross Estate with 28 garages and two areas on the Ladies Estate, where Peddars Way wants to demolish forecourts of about 30 garages at a site off Mother Julian Close and Celia Phillips Close (for six flats and 10 parking spaces) and at a site off Anne Bartholomew Road and Celia Phillips Close (for four three-bedroom townhouses and eight parking spaces).

Peddars Way is lining up plans to redevelop 20 other parking areas on the estate.

Land at Norwich Road in Besthorpe was also given over to

the housing association and a restrictive covenant stating it should only be used for garages was lifted

so it could be developed as a two-storey three-bedroom house with garage.