Plans to turn commercial site in East Wittering to mixed use building with shops and flats refused

The existing site, on Northside, The Parade, is currently home to three commercial businesses, including a barber and a chemist, but developers hoped to ‘maximise’ the site’s potential by reconfiguring and extending the building to add additional housing.

Earlier this week, Chichester District Council refused the plans on the basis that the redesigned building would prove detrimental to the character of the area, on the basis that the siting, scale, mass and height would comprise an overbearing form of development, incongruous with the rest of the town.

Officers also said the loss of existing toilet facilities might risk the viability of the commercial open space, and the development would fail to provide a high quality living environment for future occupiers.

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