New church with 'standalone spire' planned for this Preston suburb
Plans have been unveiled to demolish a Mormon church in Preston to make way for a larger place of worship on the same site.
The meeting house of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints, as it is officially known – on Longsands Lane in Fulwood – would be replaced with a so-called “stake centre” under the proposal.
According to documents lodged with Preston City Council, the move is the result of increasing congregations across Lancashire.
The Mormon church, whose first UK base was founded in Preston in 1837, is organised into wards – which are similar to a Catholic or Church of England parish – and stakes, akin to a diocese.
With many meeting houses and stake centres “operating at capacity”, the Church has decided to divide the existing Preston Stake in two – resulting in the need for a new stake centre in the area.
Under the blueprint for the redeveloped site, a free-standing spire would be erected close to a new pedestrian access point in order to “signify the building as a place of worship”, town hall planners have been told.
The new, mostly single-storey, building would sit centrally within the widest part of the cleared plot, enabling an “appropriate separation distance” to be maintained between the facility and houses to the north.
The stake centre would provide “additional chapel and teaching space to meet the Church’s current and future needs, and a cultural hall”. Parking space at the site would more than double from 39 to 97 bays.
The current meeting house, which opened in 1988, is described as being “dated” and “expensive to maintain”. Moreover, it is not large enough to operate as a stake centre.
The chapel within its replacement would be the largest of the new buildings- and second only to the spire in height. Behind it would stand the cultural hall, while the flat-roofed teaching block would be the only two-storey element.
On a handful of occasions each year, members from two or more wards within a stake meet at the stake centre for a special service.
The plans for the Fulwood site come after an expansion of the Church’s Preston England Temple, in Chorley, was given the green light late last year – with a new faith and learning centre expected to attract young people from around the world.