ISLANDERS and visitors could soon be able to take advantage of a new route up to Fort Regent, after the Chief Minister indicated that plans for a lift at Snow Hill were about to be lodged.
Part of wider redevelopment work to restore the former visitor attraction to its heyday, the lift would give access to the north of the Fort, echoing the days when cable cars transported thousands of Islanders and tourists up the hilltop in the 1970s and 80s.
Senator John Le Fondré said he was ‘expecting imminently a planning application on getting a lift in from Snow Hill, getting access to the Fort from the north’.
The Chief Minister previously floated the idea of a link in 2020, when he said details would be presented before Christmas, with a planning application the year after.
Assistant Economic Development Minister Hugh Raymond, who has responsibility for sport, said he had attended a recent ministerial meeting where it was confirmed that money was available for the long-awaited project.
‘It has become part of looking at how we get the Fort back to being a visitor attraction,’ he said.
‘If there is money to do it and it is going to get people up to the Fort, then good.’
The assistant minister added there were ‘few places to put on events’ in Jersey.
‘We have got to make sure that the Fort is visitor-friendly and ready to go for events,’ he said.
The first steps in transforming Fort Regent got under way last month with clearing work for the creation of botanical gardens, a moat and rampart gardens, heritage walks and paths.
Phase two includes plans for an entertainment, conference and exhibition venue, hotel, bowling alley and a ‘small-to-medium-sized casino’.
While details of what the proposed elevator will look like are not yet clear, previous plans put forward by Nick Socrates, of Socrates Architects, may give some indication.
In 2019, he outlined his vision for a public ‘urban park’ to regenerate Snow Hill and La Motte Street, which included two-high-speed lifts attached to the cliff face.
At the time, he said the lifts would transport the public ‘to the Fort’s historic ramparts which would offer outstanding views, the provision of much more public space and a fresh perspective over St Helier’.
Proposals for a revamped Snow Hill access were also explored in 1999, when two spires containing lifts were mooted, and in 2014, when the Fort Regent Steering Group suggested a glass-floored ‘skyway’ platform leading upwards from Snow Hill, and a 120-bedroom hotel and restaurant, all connected via a lift.
Jersey’s cable cars opened in 1970 and transported the last of their passengers 30 years ago.
While the cable car station at Snow Hill was removed long ago, the Fort Regent station was only demolished in 2018 – three decades after becoming redundant.
As far back as 1874, the area was also home to the St Helier (Snow Hill) Train Station for the Eastern Jersey Railway.
A bus station was built there in 1932, later replaced by the cable cars.
