St Helier Constable Simon Crowcroft has called for a feasibility study to be carried out as to whether the site could incorporate a park and delay any proposed letting of Warwick Farm to Andium Homes.
Andium Homes has said it wants to redevelop Warwick Farm – the former site of the States nurseries – so that it can build three-bedroom houses for first-time buyers priced at around £325,000 to £330,000.
Chief Minister Ian Gorst has shown support for a potential first-time buyer scheme at the site, on Grande Route de St Jean.
However, Mr Crowcroft believes that Warwick Farm could be a good location for a country park on the outskirts of town.
He argues that a proposition he successfully lodged seven years ago to carry out a feasibility study to provide countryside for ‘residents of the most built-up part of the Island’ has not been acted on and now wants to explore whether Warwick Farm could be a potential solution.
In his proposition, Mr Crowcroft said: ‘On 15 June this year, the Future St Helier Group received a brief verbal report from the Environment Department that the proposed country park was probably unachievable.
‘By some strange coincidence, this meeting took place on the same day as the deadline for the receipt of expressions of interest for agricultural or horticultural purposes for a nine-year lease on Warwick Farm, a publicly-owned site in the Green Zone, which had previously been considered as a potential site for the new hospital, and which the Chief Minister and Minister for Housing had also suggested would be ideal for affordable housing.
He added that if a feasibility study showed that a country park on the outskirts of town was possible then it would be ‘folly to sign away’ the land.
‘The States are asked to allow a six-month period of grace before Warwick Farm is let, so that the long-delayed feasibility study on an approved Island Plan proposal can be carried out, and a proposition and report can be lodged should the study prove positive.’
The proposition is due to be debated on Tuesday 26 September.
