Wolverhampton Council awards £4.6m contract to developer for delayed homes plan
A council has awarded a £4.6m contract to a developer as part of much-delayed plans to build 17 new homes in Wolverhampton.
The new council homes would be built on a field off Oakley Road in Penn, Wolverhampton, after being touted as a site for housing as far back as 2014.
City of Wolverhampton Council said it has now awarded the £4.6m contract to Cannock-based developer Morro Partnerships to build nine three-bed, four two-bed and two two-bed homes on the fields as well as a two-bed bungalow.
The fields off Oakley Road in Penn, Wolverhampton, were earmarked as a site for future housing by the council as far back as 2014. Three planning applications have since been approved by the local authority’s planners since 2019 with the number of homes reduced from 19 to 17 when the final application was approved at the end of 2023.
The council had finally approved plans in January that year for 19 new homes but the total was reduced by two following the submission of another application that was approved 11 months later.
A statement included with the application in 2023 said: “The site was originally due to be developed for 19 affordable homes in 2019 and a planning application was submitted and approved for a mixture of one, two and three-bedroom properties.
“This proposal is no longer viable due to a change in building regulations coming into effect, which provided us with an opportunity to review the design and layout of the site and improve the arrangement of the homes.
A council-owned property was demolished in 2016 to make way for the new homes but the proposed access route remains fenced-off and the adjoining fields still remain untouched.
