Public consultation closes tomorrow on a pre-application exercise on proposals to build houses at the site of the Tannoy factory in Coatbridge.
However, site owners Paloma Capital have said their planning application to construct 60 houses is a “back-up plan” – and that they are continuing to search for a new industrial tenant for the premises.
Saying the two processes “will run in parallel”, they insist that: “We have tried everything in our gift to keep [Tannoy] on site,” adding that the audio manufacturing firm has a lease in place for a further three years with an option for further extension.
Tannoy first announced its plans to close the Coatbridge factory in 2016, with its parent company telling the 70 local staff that production operations would move to a new manufacturing plant in China and the local research, development and marketing activities to Manchester.
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Charles Lunnon, who is Paloma Capital’s director of investment and asset management, said: “The Coatbridge site has always been industrial and so we have started our search for a replacement tenant who can take up the space post-2023.
“In the meantime, we need to make sure we have all our bases covered and if the market is such that we cannot find a new tenant we have an alternative use, in the form of housing.”
A live online consultation event took place last month to showcase the housing plans for the Palacecraig Street site, to “help inform the preparation of detailed plans” ahead of submitting a planning application for the potential residential use in January.
The project website states that it would include “a mixture of family homes alongside smaller starter or downsizer homes”, ranging from one to three bedrooms and from flats to detached houses and adds: “Should the application be successful, Paloma Capital would then market the site to housebuilders to take the proposed development forward to the next stage.”
