Move to get Wednesbury housing project completed

A developer may have to start work on a stalled housing project after complaints the site is an eyesore.

Bellway Homes has still not finished work on the scheme in Wednesbury seven years after planning permission was granted.

Sandwell's economy chief has asked officers to see if there are enforcement powers they can use to speed up the project.

People living near the former Sandwell College site at Woden Road South submitted a petition to the council, urging members to "encourage" Bellway to finish.

They say unfinished homes and metal fences are an eyesore but Bellway spokesman Julian Kenyon said today the economic downturn meant it had no plans to finish the properties in the near future, but the site is kept under "regular review pending an improvement in market conditions".

Council cabinet member for jobs and economy, Councillor Ian Jones said he and fellow cabinet member for housing Simon Hackett and safety boss Derek Rowley would visit the site.

He said: "This has been in an area that has lain empty for seven years.

"In 2008 they actually asked for a variation in the planning application which we allowed them to do so as not to build apartments but to build three bedroom houses which we agreed, and still nothing almost three years later.

"I have asked officers to go away and look at enforcement powers that we have.

"We need to investigate the enforcement of the planning. It is totally unacceptable that a profitable organisation is showing such indifference to the residents of those areas who put the faith in them.

"It is not a good advertisement for Bellway and I am sure that when we are looking for partners in the future we are looking for responsible home builders and at the moment Bellway is stretching the patience of the residents and of the local members as well."

Hundreds of houses have already been built at the site where work began in 2004.

The majority of building work has been finished but two plots, including a small apartment block and four houses as well as a single individual plot, remain unfinished.