'I agree Savick needs sprucing up - but it's still a brilliant area'

Once it had a reputation for being one of the toughest council estates in Preston.
Lyn outside her cafeLyn outside her cafe
Lyn outside her cafe

Now the Savick area of the city is getting a boost from an ambitious blueprint to turn it into “a high quality residential neighbourhood.”

Already the estate pub, a magnet for trouble over the years, has been demolished and replaced by smart new houses.

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A row of shops, topped by run-down maisonettes, will be next to get a visit from the bulldozers. In their place will be more state-of-the-art homes, a new district library and a convenience store.

SavickSavick
Savick

And only last week plans went in to build even more stylish dwellings on the adjacent site of a former care home.

Yet none of Savick’s new properties are for sale - they will all be rented out to local families at less than the market rate.

Preston’s largest social housing landlord, Community Gateway Association, is footing the bill for the regeneration to build up its housing stock in the city, which currently stands at more than 6,500 homes.

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Following an investment windfall of £95m in July the housing association, which took over the running of Preston’s council housing 15 years ago, is planning to build 600 new properties over the next four years - all of them for the affordable rent market.

The not-for-profit community business has also stepped up housebuilding on small plots of land in other parts of the city in response to a growing need for low-rent homes locally.

“As an organisation we are committed to reinvesting in our existing homes, while creating (new) homes that meet the needs of our customers,” said Lee Garry, CGA’s head of asset management.

“This particular regeneration project has and continues to evolve, being steered by the voices of the Savick community.”

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The latest planning application submitted to the city council is for 13 homes on a plot of open space where the former Ainsdale House care home once stood.

It is the fifth piece of a housebuilding jigsaw by CGA which is designed to redevelop Savick and give it a new lease of life.

Two small parcels of land in the Ainsdale Drive area were snapped up for new homes in 2016. The same year the company was given planning permission for six houses on the site of the former Savick pub, closed in 2008 and demolished in 2011. Those new homes have already been built.

Just last week the scheme to knock down the row of shops, which includes Savick Library and its maisonettes above, was given the green light, despite opposition from up to 1,000 people in a petition.

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And now plans for the site of the former care home have been lodged with the council.

If approved the two latest projects, totalling 25 mostly semi-detached homes, will be built together and could be ready for tenants by next autumn.

Cafe owner Lynda Day’s business will almost certainly be a casualty of the redevelopment. Yet she accepts the Savick estate could do with a facelift.

“I agree it needs sprucing up - I’m not disputing that,” she said. “But I still think it’s a brilliant area.

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People put everything down to it being a bad area, but it isn’t. OK, there’s good and bad wherever you go.

“I don’t have any problems with Savick. The pub was a brilliant pub too, but they shut it down. People say it was because of the area, but it closed because no-one would take it on.

“I’m not going to call Gateway, even though they are planning to knock the shops down.

“They are trying to build the area up and you can’t fault them for that.”

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“We were closed down from March to July by Covid,” she said. “And we have been only opening three days a week to get the business back on its feet.

“So to find out the planning application to knock the shops down has now been granted has put a tin lid on an awful year.

“I started a petition to save the shops last year and it was signed by about 1,000 people. But that hasn’t counted for anything, it seems.

“There’s only us and the newsagent’s open now, everything else has shut down.

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“This is my living. So does my husband, my daughter and another member of staff. I worry what will happen when it closes. And I worry what the people of Savick will do too. They might be building more social housing, but where are these people going to shop?

“We have a lot of regulars and we also have loads of schoolchildren who come in for our £1 butties.

“I’ve looked for other premises on the Savick, but there isn’t anything. No disrespect to Community Gateway for trying to build better homes, but what about us?”

A Community Gateway spokesman said: “From the outset we committed to including a retail unit within our redevelopment plans and consulted with local people to determine what type of unit they would like to see.

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“Feedback was overwhelmingly in favour of a general convenience store and we would be keen now to hear from anyone who is interested in leasing this new planned shop.”

Meanwhile, ward councillor Phil Crowe has welcomed the plans to improve housing in the area, but stresses the library is a valuable asset to the community.

He said: “They spent lot of money on the old stock that was there.

“Half the shops were empty and only one - the cafe - wanted to carry on. The land at the back of those shops was flattened and ringfenced,

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“Hopefully they’ll build a new library and some sort of retail unit attached to it.

“The library is a community hub, the staff there go out of way to do things for the community, sessions after schools, activities for children, and courses, or lending books to people who can’t get out.

“Gateway are all about housing, not retail units, so its a different ballgame to them, but they are trying to accommodate everybody as best they can, that’s the impression I have.”

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