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- Joined: Fri Jan 26, 2018 5:01 pm
Ash wrote:As has happened with at least one other student block, Watkin Jones have applied for temporary permission to house non-students for the first year of operation. The reason given is as follows.The application seeks the temporary change of use of application ref 15/03097/MJR from solely student accommodation to allow for the use of both students and non-students. The development is due to complete 31 August 2018. With University courses commencing September 2018 this does not allow for adequate time to market or agree
tenancies for all of the units. The Groups experience in developing and managing student accommodation shows
that students prefer to see the accommodation before agreeing a tenancy. In this instance, there is a risk that the accommodation may not be fully occupied, particularly when students can start to book accommodation from May 2018.
All of which may well be true - but it does suggest that there isn't a huge unmet demand out there for this form of student accomodation. Besides which, this isn't a case of the build timetable slipping. It was always intended to be completed in August.
My concern for them is that they won't have it finished by the end of August. They've still got so much to do and I wonder if this temporary change of use application is in anticipation of that. But agree with you and other comments - I think the student accommodation rush is coming to an end. Happy for some bland designs not to go forward but I would still love to see the planned development next to the Mercure on Newport road go ahead - student accommodation or otherwise. It is such a good quality design