Persimmon flats plan near York Barbican consultation site

As The Press reported last month, the 2.2 acre site, close to York Barbican and next to the StayCity aparthotel is across the road from the Bar Walls and has been disused since the former Barbican swimming pool and its car park shut in 2004.

York housebuilder Persimmon has now launched a new consultation website on the plans submitted to York Council to build 240 apartments.

Persimmon say 240 apartments will be built on the site with 53 to be transferred to a registered housing provider.

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Persimmon staff at the site back in 2023 (Image: Haydn Lewis) The consultation is asking members of the public for their views on the updated plans for both the larger site of former swimming pool and a small plot of land on the corner of Fawcett Street and Kent Street.

The main area to the east of the Barbican and Staycity Aparthotel measures approximately 2.14 acres while the smaller plot which fronts onto Fawcett Street to the south west of the Barbican Centre is approximately 0.12 acres.

The buildings on the larger site will be no higher than the existing StayCity aparthotel.

On the smaller site there are plans to build 12 apartments with a space on the ground floor for community use – the operator and exact use of this space will be shaped by the consultation.

Persimmon say 240 apartments will be built on the site with 53 to be transferred to a registered housing provider (Image: Persimmon) An initial Persimmon scheme was mothballed because of the economic crisis, although the aparthotel got built on the portion of the site where the pool had been.

A Persimmon Yorkshire spokesperson said: “We’ve worked extensively over the last two years with the council, architects and engineers to produce plans worthy of this location.

“Members of the public can now comment on the plans on the site as well as via the council’s planning public access portal.”

As The Press reported last week, York Cycle Campaign has already commented saying it welcomed aspects of the Persimmon, but said “the design of the bike park currently fails to meet a number of requirements” over the provision of space for the different designs of bicycle currently in use.

In the intervening years there have been previous digs on the site with a woman’s skeleton found on the Fawcett Street site believed to be that of Lady Isabel German, an ‘anchoress’ - or religious hermit - who spent her life shut away in a single room at the long-vanished All Saints Church in Fishergate in the 15th century.

People can have their say by visiting the consultation website here.