A major healthcare group’s bid to develop a specialist care facility on the former Monarch Laundry site in south Belfast looks set to fail after planning officials cited flood risk.
The Holywood-headquartered Healthcare Ireland Group has proposed a 158-bed nursing and residential facility on the site at Donegall Road, which lies between the Village area of the city and the busy Westlink and Broadway Roundabout junction.
The Co Down group said the facility would involve a total investment of £18.5 million, creating 185 full-time care roles.
It has pointed to the demand for such services in Belfast, following the closure of seven care homes across the city since 2015, resulting in the loss of 223 beds.
But a report due to be considered by Belfast City Council’s planning committee on Tuesday has recommended refusal on the grounds of flood risk and insufficient parking.
While city council planning officials praised the design of the building and accepted there is a need for care home beds in Belfast, the report said the site lies within the one-in-100 year “climate change fluvial flood plain”, i.e. a site likely to be to flooded in the future due to climate change.
Officials estimate the construction cost at £12m, but said the material benefits of the scheme outlined by the developer “are not in the planning balance considered to outweigh the policy presumption against accommodation for vulnerable groups within the flood plain”.
The report also states the 38 parking spaces proposed for the site is 20 less than the minimum required.
NI Water has also objected to the development on grounds of insufficient waste-water infrastructure, but Belfast City Council’s planning department said it would be “unreasonable” for the local authority to refuse permission on those grounds.
Founded by entrepreneur Gilbert Yates in 2015, the Healthcare Ireland Group has grown rapidly over the past nine years and currently runs 25 care homes in the north.
But it wants to significantly expand its portfolio to around 40 sites, with plans to establish facilities in the Republic and in Britain.
The Co Down group is currently progressing a bid to repurpose the former Loughshore Hotel in Carrickfergus into a new 121-bed care home.
Documents submitted in support of the bid for the new south Belfast care facility said 750 care home beds have been lost in Northern Ireland since 2015.
Agents for Healthcare Ireland said Belfast City Council’s local development plan (LDP) for 2035 outlines the need for 820 additional beds.
A report from O’Kane Commercial, which specialises in healthcare property, said: “Rather than bed provision increasing in line with the requirement, we are experiencing a reduction of bed spaces.
“As a result, it is likely that the need will be more than 820 beds.”
Built in 1904, a red brick chimney is the only reminder of the demolished Monarch Laundry at the junction of Donegall Road and Monarch Street.
Over the past 25 years, the site has been linked with a new supermarket and more recently, a residential development for 53 apartments, which secured outline planning approval in 2019.
The site later went on the market in late 2021, with offers invited in excess of £1.325m.
The waste ground site, which is adjacent to Translink’s slip-road for Belfast Grand Central Station, has been used in recent years for loyalist bonfires.
