Common land exchange for affordable homes rejected

A DEVELOPMENT of 56 affordable homes in Swansea has taken a knock after a minister decided the common land they're planned for can’t be exchanged with land just over a mile away.

- STAFF REPORTER

Many people are celebrating having fought to protect a landscape in West Cross they hold dear.

The development site comprises land that's part of Fairwood and Clyne Common - although it’s known locally as West Cross Common - and the 56 homes have been given planning permission by Swansea Council.

But because it’s common land so-called exchange land has to be identified and registered under the 2006 Commons Act. Applicant the Somerset Trust identified replacement land near Northway, Bishopston, for this purpose and applied to the Welsh Government to effectively swap it with the housing land.

The trust argued there would be nature conservation benefits at both sites and a 100% affordable housing scheme in a location which “desperately needs’ it should be given considerable weight.

The Gower Society and Open Spaces Society, which opposed the application, contended the development land in West Cross had substantial value for many people who lived close by. They also argued nature conservation would be harmed if the application was approved and that the replacement land was a “poor substitute”.