Milford Haven | Archive | 2006 | March | 23
From the archive, first published Thursday 23rd Mar 2006.
IF THE council proceed with the decision to sell Blackbridge depot to Milford Haven Port Authority, the site could become the UK's largest construction village.
The port authority plan to develop the site in partnership with Haven Facilities, the company originally in talks to buy the site until a Mercury article on the sale prompted new offers and a subsequent tender exercise.
At the end of the tender process, however, Haven Facilities' offer was well down on some of the others, prompting the port authority to step in with more cash.
While the cabinet decided to sell the site to the port authority on the understanding it's used for a container terminal, thanks to the Freedom of Information Act, the Mercury is able to reveal more about what's planned.
In the short term (four to five years), Haven Facilities plan to develop a construction village for around 500 LNG/power station/Bluestone workers, with a further possibility of a 100 caravan facility.
The village would include licensed premises, other leisure facilities and a 600-space car park.
The building would be modular and of the current `Travel Lodge' type, Haven Facilities founder Peter Scott tells the council in an e-mailed synopsis.
"Much time has been spent with the providers of both the modular buildings and the providers of soft services, eg catering/hotel/security etc and this would be a operation and the biggest in the UK.
"The intention is for the village to be at the Milford end of the site and for the remainder to be used for fabrication/lay-down/storage/plant depots/ancillary uses. To date, we have received a good response to this idea and have interested parties who wish to create a jetty for their purposes.
"In all of the above, we are very conscious of the need to give existing local companies the opportunity to become involved and similarly we will expect to fill many of the catering/cleaning/accommodation jobs locally.
"This is a bold concept but should take up at least a part of the perceived need for accommodation as seen by PBI and others."
In the longer term, Haven Facilities say they would explore the economic viability of the provision of a container port, and a cruise liner terminal.
Mr Scott says: "This would be a massive undertaking and involve a large amount of planning and civil engineering works coupled with impact assessments and a complete re-engineering of the infrastructure of the site and possible further land purchase."
© Newsquest Media Group 2008