A new attempt to turn a plot of land in Wednesbury that has been empty for more than a decade into housing has been given the green light by the council.

The move will see seven terraced homes built in Addison Street near Wednesbury High Street after an application was approved by Sandwell Council. 

The land had been empty for several years before plans to finally do something with the land were approved by Sandwell Council in 2015.
But while planners gave the thumbs up nearly nine years ago, little to nothing has been carried out with the layout and size of the homes, garden and driveways all redrawn several times since first being put forward in 2015.

The plans were put forward again in 2022 with a different layout and approved again by Sandwell Council before a new plan with another revised layout was put forward by developer Dhaliwal 75 last month.

The application showed that West Bromwich-based developer Dhaliwal 75 had enquired about building 21 flats on the land last year before a revised scheme for seven terraced houses was submitted.

According to the application, the land is contaminated with lead and mine surveys have found two shafts that would need to be made safe before anything was built.

The land is not far from a long-empty and council-owned site in Mount Road in Wednesbury – which has been plagued by issues since permission was granted to build homes on the land a decade ago.

The move to build 45 homes on the site of the former coal mine was backed by the council in November – but only after it was redrawn to avoid being built next to several capped mines.

The land had been earmarked for housing by Sandwell Council for several years and the planning application was in addition to a wider plan to build up to 365 homes on land around Mounts Road. A plan to build 45 homes on the derelict and fenced-off site was approved by Sandwell Council in 2014 but the work was never carried out over concerns about the below mines – with around a quarter of the land now unusable because it is classed as a ‘stand-off zone’ which cannot be used for new homes by law.

The main issue is the capped mines are still visible which means the layout of the planned estate has had to be redrawn following several mineshaft surveys.

The restrictions and subsequent redesign have led the developer to include two apartment buildings in the plan and move all of the homes away from the capped mineshafts.