Nile + Villiers plans lodged

Set for Sunderland’s Sunniside area, the 75-home project is being advanced by council subsidiary Siglion, with Town engaged as development manager.

As described in the design & access statement submitted with the plans, this is a key element of Riverside Sunderland and the city centre housing eco-system, along with projects such as the Vaux neighbourhood.

Development manager Town is working on the application for Siglion, a wholly-owned subsidiary of Sunderland City Council.

The project team also includes XSite, Create Streets, Apex, Shadbolt Group, Clark Degnan, The Environment Partnership and Civic Engineers.

The DAS said: “Nile + Villiers has been designed to encourage a culture of stewardship among residents. Buildings will back onto shared gardens providing space for the community to socialise and grow food. The street frontages will overlook safe, green streets designed to minimise traffic.”

Along with 75 homes, the project will include up to 4,300 sq ft of commercial space, across a maximum of 10 units. The housing will be a mix of terraces and maisonettes. Sixty homes will be available through private market rent.

Most of the site is already allocated for housing, and is included in the council’s brownfield land register. Sunderland owns the whole site.

In its planning statement, Town said: “This is a significant project for Sunniside and the wider city centre, bringing forward a high[1]quality scheme with high levels of environmental and social sustainability.

“A key objective of the proposed development is to support Sunderland’s City Plan in bringing a residential population back in to the city centre, offering good homes and a vibrant city life. Sunniside is a large part of the city’s urban core and it has an important part to play in the city reaching its potential.”

Sunderland is indeed keen to push forward city living in the area as it looks to build the leisure offer. A student accommodation proposal next to the Elephant Tea Rooms is a recent example of schemes approved.

It was reported last spring that build-to-rent specialist Placefirst would support Sunderland and partners on funding and management of Nile + Villiers, the organisation being directly responsible for a further 140 homes elsewhere in the Riverside masterplan.

The Nile + Villiers plans are now validated on Sunderland City Council’s planning portal, and can be viewed with the reference number 24/ 00562/FU4.