St Columb homes mark milestone for Cornish housing charity

Coastline Housing has officially opened a development of 26 new homes in St Columb, one of which included the local housing charity’s 5000^th affordable home in Cornwall.

The scheme in St Columb comprises 15 homes for affordable rent and 11 shared ownership homes. The scheme was made possible thanks to just over £1million of funding from Homes England.

New resident Carol Smale cut the ribbon to open the scheme alongside fellow residents, staff from Coastline Housing and other partners involved in the project.

Mark Duddridge, Chair of Coastline Housing, said: “We are delighted to bring these homes to St Columb and it marks a very special milestone for Coastline Housing because this new development takes our total number of homes in ownership up to over 5,000.

“This means that we are providing good quality, affordable housing for more people than ever in the county and our development programme has many more in the pipeline too. Every new home we deliver is another step towards helping ease the acute affordable housing crisis felt by so many in Cornwall.”

The homes were built by Truro-based builders EBC Partnerships and have been given the street names Halidon Terrance and Polita Way, both chosen by the Town Council.

Halidon Way was chosen thanks to its connections with a historical figure in the town. Sir John Arundell of St Columb Major was granted the right to a weekly market in the town after supporting King Edward III at the Battle of Halidon Hill in 1333.

Properties in this development feature Coastline’s enhanced biodiversity measures. This means that bee bricks, bat and bird boxes and hedgehog holes have been installed across the scheme.

Allister Young, Chief Executive of Coastline Housing, adds: “We are very grateful to the support received from St Columb Town Council in bringing this development into being. Councillors were positive and supportive from the initial planning stages onwards as they had identified the housing need in this area. We were also fascinated to hear from them the history of St Columb’s part in the Battle of Halidon Hill and really pleased that this has been reflected in one of the name choices for this scheme.”

Residents have moved in and are happily settling down in time for Christmas in their new homes.