Changes proposed for Lilidorei play village development at Northumberland's The Alnwick Garden

Lilidorei is a high-profile new development at The Alnwick Garden, which aims to attract significant numbers of additional visitors and spend to the town each year. It is backed by Government funding via the Borderlands scheme.

Planning permission was granted by Northumberland County Council in July 2018 for the play village, ‘comprising cabins, chapel, main hall, play structure and ancillary accommodation in a landscaped setting’.

In January 2021, an application to vary the condition relating to the approved plans was lodged with the local authority, seeking to replace the drawings previously submitted in order to ‘pick up minor material changes to the design following further development of the brief’.

An updated design and access statement says that ‘as a part of the approved application, a design was developed which takes into account its topography, landscape and heritage sensitivities’, before claiming the changes ‘do not change the principles discussed and agreed for the landscape and access routes’.

It later adds: ‘The emerging development proposal aims to offer improvements to the historic landscape through sensitive new development with reference to the site’s current condition, boundaries, views and available reference archive data.’

However, Alnwick Town Council, Alnwick Civic Society plus various statutory consultees are concerned that the impact of the changes is not being assessed properly.

The town council’s response says that while it remains supportive of the development, it feels this variation bid ‘has such significant changes from the approved application’ that it ‘would need to see more information to be able to make detailed comments’, in particular relating to the materials and size of each of the proposed buildings.

Meanwhile, Alnwick Civic Society ‘considers that the variation application should be rejected until there is more clarity on the impact of the proposed changes on the local landscape’, expressing particular concern about views from the north, including main access roads the B6341 and the B1340, and the Pastures.

‘The new site plan indicates major changes including some new buildings of substantial size and some buildings and structures relocated,’ its response adds. ‘There are, however, no detailed drawings of the individual buildings and structures and no visualisations to show how they would fit into the re-contoured landscape.’

Similar concerns about the lack of detail, how the development’s impact might change plus requests for further information have also come from the council as lead local flood authority, the county ecologist, Historic England, and Highways England (which is responsible for the A1), while the council’s own highways team has provided a lengthy response seeking to ensure the correct conditions are applied.

Cllr Martin Swinbank, chairman of Alnwick Town Council’s planning committee, said: “The town council supports the principle of this application and the wider value this visitor attraction will bring to Alnwick, but the detail must be carefully considered.

“The implications for the town in terms of parking, traffic flow, and potential harm to the historic approaches and other matters, must be adequately assessed through the formal planning process. There needs to be a lot more information provided regarding these changes to the agreed plans, so that a proper assessment can be made.

“We must get this right, as the future of the town is rightly a real concern for all of our residents and businesses.”

Borderlands and backlash

In October 2020, we reported that the £15.5million development was expected to start on site in early 2021 and open to visitors from spring 2022.

Billed as the largest play structure of its type in the world, the attraction is forecast to pull in a total of 253,000 visitors a year, generating additional spend of £12.1million annually and supporting 224 additional gross full-time-equivalent jobs.

It is one of the trail-blazing early projects for the Borderlands Inclusive Growth Deal, with a £5million grant already signed off.

The Borderlands Partnership is a collaboration between five local authorities – Carlisle, Cumbria, Dumfries and Galloway, Northumberland and Scottish Borders, which represent 10% of the UK’s landmass and an area larger than Wales.

The deal, worth at least £350million, aims to create thousands of new job opportunities, bring millions of extra tourists to the area and unlock investment in towns.

There was a major backlash when Lilidorei was first unveiled in 2017 and it was revealed that the then Labour-run county council planned to back the project with an £8.5million loan.

The criticism came from all quarters, including Tory councillors, resulting in then Labour leader, Coun Grant Davey, agreeing to remove the loan from the authority’s spending plan.

In March 2019, when the Borderlands deal was first announced, this row reared its head again, although this time the project was being backed by the Conservative Government and county council.

The dramatic events we are all experiencing are having a major impact on many of our local valued advertisers and consequently the advertising that we receive. We are now more reliant than ever on you helping us to provide you with news by buying a copy of our newspaper. If you can, please do pick up a copy when you are at the shops. Thank you for your support.