Hello!
Welcome to our November blog update about our work in Somerton.
Our last Resident Steering Group meeting was on 2 November at Nexus House, with a combination of people attending in person and online. 6 residents and the 3 Councillors attend the meeting. Terry and Andrew from Oxford Architects attended online, to talk through the design activity we are working on currently.
You can read the minutes in full here.
Project Plan
Our project plan has been set for 2022 – 2026.
To assist us with our plans for Acacia Avenue we are looking at purchasing the land at the rear of Acacia Avenue. We will also be looking at phasing of the site to determine how the works will be carried out on site.
Further surveys have been carried out to the 2 pilot properties and we will get a final report on the findings and firm up our specification for the refurbishment works.
We are looking to submit planning permission in 2023. This was due before Christmas 2022 but we aren’t in a position to do so. We are working on this to ensure we are ready to submit in 2023.
We will continue with the voluntary purchase scheme for regeneration areas and we will also be looking to submit approvals to Welsh Government.
These time scales are indicative and may change.
Valuer
Valuations are progressing along, to date we have bought back 4 properties. There have been 43 valuation requests and these valuations are in different stages of the process, that being with homeowners appointing a second valuer which there are 6. We have 14 properties in the legal stages. There are 78 waiting for the first valuation to take place and 11 have had the first valuation.
Since the community engagement event in September, more homeowners are requesting a valuation.
Procurement
We are working with our internal procurement team to look at getting the right contractor to carry out the refurbishment works to the 2 pilot properties.
For the regeneration works we are looking into Modern Methods of Construction (MMC), we will be looking at testing the market with soft market testing to see what companies or contractors are out there using MMC.
Design Update
We have met with Welsh Governments and an internal meeting with colleagues throughout NCH, and have spoken to our key stakeholders about our proposals for Somerton. We have received great constructive feedback and have made changes to our schemes. Alongside the feedback that we receive monthly from the steering group and from the community engagement event in September.
Feedback from the surveys completed from information shown at the community engagement event can be viewed here.
We also looking at trends from all the feedback that we have received and will be looking at our designs and reviewing them. Such as is the location right for older persons accommodation, are the flats in the right locations, is there adequate parking for each home, is the shop located in the correct location.
For the next steps we will be looking at the areas that currently don’t have any refurbishment or regeneration plans and looking at what fit will best suit these areas
Communication
We will be looking at how we can maximise the number of responses we get back from community events.
A communication will go out before Christmas with a round up of 2022 and what we will be working on in 2023.
Rebecca Sluman, Development Officer at Newport City Homes, will attend this surgery. If anyone has any questions about the regeneration of Somerton please pop along and speak to Rebecca.
Time and Date of Next Meeting
Wednesday 7 December at 17:30pm
We hope that this blog has been useful – if you have any questions, or if there’s anything you’d like us to cover in future blogs, please get in touch with us at community@newportcityhomes.com.
Thanks,
The Somerton team