''Depressing" and 'bland' is how one councillor described the design of a huge student village already approved for the outskirts of Penryn.

At a meeting of Falmouth Town Council's planning committee approved the designs in principle but made a number of recommendations to the developers of the The Penvose Zero Carbon Student Village, between Treluswell and Treliever roundabouts

The development was approved by Cornwall Council's strategic planning committee back in September 2018.

A reserved matters application for appearance, landscaping, layout and scale was discussed by Falmouth Town Council's planning committee on Monday.

Opening the debate Cllr John Spargo said the design of the village was very 'disappointing'.

"The architecture is depressing with a lack of variety among the buildings," he said. "It is actually quite bland, there is no colour. There doesn't seem to be any effort being made in making it an interesting place to live, and I think that's really disappointing.

"They should be pushed into more effort on how they use their materials."

Cllr Young raised concerns about cycle routes, although they are included in the development from the village to the university and Falmouth and also the loss of hedgerows.

"There is a massive loss of hedges, it's huge," she said. "They're putting in more than they're taking out but it takes decades for these things to get to the point they are now on that site and it's just scandalous."

However Falmouth mayor Steve Eva took a different point of view saying it was a good thing as it would take the pressure off housing in Falmouth.

"I believe it is something we should be supporting," he said. "If you're going to be building for 2,500 students then you are probably releasing 800 houses into the community which are rented out at the moment to non-families.

"We can argue on the look. I agree with the hedges but they are putting in more hedges than they're taking out and they need time to mature, and I understand that, but my prime aim really is to reduce pressure on the housing in Falmouth. Therefore anything's better than nothing out there."

Cllr Jayne Kirkham proposed the council supported the proposal subject to there being sufficient cycle routes, electric charging points for electric bikes, the design of the residential area and the loss of mature hedgerows.

The huge project is designed to take students out of Falmouth as numbers grow to prevent speculative student developments in Falmouth and Penryn.

It follows the outline approval granted on September 26, 2018 for a student village, new highway access, landscaping and associated infrastructure on land at Penvose Farm Roskrow Penryn Cornwall

The development is for 1,858 student bed spaces in a village complex arrangement, comprising of a series of ‘cluster flat’ blocks and townhouses, including 97 wheelchair accessible units.

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