School homes plan should be rejected, council says

A planning application to use a former private school's site for homes should be rejected, council officers have said.

Churchill Living Limited wants to build 51 retirements apartments on the grounds of Hemdean House School, in Hemdean Road, Caversham, along with 10 flats in its former school house.

The school first opened in 1859 but closed in July 2024 because of "ever-falling numbers and few prospective pupils". Ofsted said it had 44 pupils but capacity for 140 when it shut.

Reading Borough Council's planning officers have recommended that its planning committee reject Churchill Living's project, which has been opposed by hundreds of people.

In giving 22 reasons for why the application should not go ahead, the officers said the project, if approved, would be "excessive" and "result in an overly dominant, visually stark, intrusive and unsympathetic development".

The officers added that it would "involve and require unsympathetic alterations" to the school and its lodge.

The local authority said it has received 110 letters of objection to the plan and a petition opposed to it with just over 600 signatures.

The council's planning committee will be asked to decide the application at a meeting on Wednesday.