Reptiles at risk from flats plan

11:05am Wednesday 3rd October 2007

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Thousands of protected reptiles are at risk from plans to put a five-storey tower block on their home.

Developers want to put 12 flats on the site of former allotments to the east of Highcroft Villas in Brighton.

Neighbours and nature lovers last year campaigned against a seven-storey block for 30 flats on the land, where slow-worms are common.

Following a series of protests developer Kingsbury Estate Limited withdrew their application for planning consent but have now re-submitted revised proposals.

New plans for the site, which has lain derelict for eight years, are still being put together but will probably include two bridges for pedestrian and car access, indoor parking for up to 16 cars and at least five floors.

If planners at Brighton and Hove City Council give it the green light there will be six one-bedroom and six two-bedroom flats, some with balconies, at least five at affordable housing prices and a couple of penthouses with roof-top terraces.

Bob Westley, the chairman of the Prestonville Community Association which led the past protests, said: "It is a disgraceful development.

"Even if this is smaller than last time this is just not the place for a development at all.

"The land is very steep and difficult to build on and there has been lots of rock falls around there. To make any development financially viable there it would have to be very high with lots of flats which is just not appropriate for the road.

"People just want it to go back to being allotments.

"This just doesn't seem to make sense, especially considering the environmental aspect of the slow worms."

The slow-worm is protected from intentional killing, injuring and sale under the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981.

Since plans for the site would take over two-thirds of the legless lizards' habitat they would have to be moved to another site - probably Wild Park.

Dr Martyn Stenning, an ecologist who works at the nearby University of Sussex, said the process of moving slow-worms to a different habitat was a complex one and should only be done if the building is necessary.

He said: "A specialist would have to be called in and they would need to make sure each and every last slow-worm was caught and taken to a suitable location which could be difficult to find. At this time of year there would be added complications because they all hibernate.

"It is an offence to kill any of the animals and if workers came in with all their machinery they would probably die.

"Slow worms, as the name suggests are very slow and can't get out of the way of things like that.

"If the building is necessary they would have to go through the procedure but if its not it would be better to build somewhere else."

Plans to build 12 flats were refused by the city council in 1999. The decision was overturned on appeal a year later but permission lapsed before building work started.