NEW plans have come forward to develop a small vacant site near Darwen Town Centre with eight three-bedroomed houses.

The scheme, proposed 12 years after a similar project was proposed and later abandoned, has been welcomed by politicians as the sort of ‘brownfield’ development that the town needs.

In January 2015 Hampshire Associates, of Duckworth Street, Darwen, applied for permission to build a curved ‘mews’ terrace of two and three-storey houses on Spring Gardens off the A666 Bolton Road.

Now Crown Mews Property Ltd from Albert Mill in Lower Darwen have come up with a new scheme for a terrace of eight properties, also thee-bedroomed, stepped up the sloped terrain, four stories at the front and three at the rear.

Borough regeneration boss, Cllr Phil Riley, said the new plan was ‘just the sort of development of a difficult brownfield site we want to see in Darwen’.

His welcome has been echoed by leading Conservative councillor Jacquie Slater and borough Liberal Democrat group leader David Foster.

A design and access statement submitted to Blackburn with Darwen council planners by Clitheroe-based IWA Architects outlines the new scheme which has a straight frontage with the eight ‘contemporary’ homes provided with their own garages and private gardens.

It said: “Spring Gardens is a brown-field site on the west side of the Bolton Road, 400metres from the centre of Darwen.

The site is 49m long and 27m wide and runs north-south. There is a 10m change in level across the site.

“The proposal is to construct a terrace of eight townhouses, stepped in pairs, to follow the slope of the site and minimise the amount of excavation.”

Cllr Riley said: “I am really pleased. This is a good use of a vacant site which will benefit Darwen and bring people and trade to the town centre.”

Cllr Slater, a member of the borough planning committee, said: “This is good news. Far batter to develop a small, untidy brownfield site like that than gobble up green fields.”

Cllr Foster said: “This is the sort of Brownfield development we need and will be good for the neighbourhood and the town.”

A link between Springfield Street and Spring Gardens will remain, by means of a footpath and flight of steps.”