Gloucestershire’s new Coombe Hill hub will see a rotting highways depot and out-of-county fire training centre replaced with new state-of-the-art facilities on land between Cheltenham and Gloucester.
Gloucestershire County Council’s cabinet members unanimously agreed to reclaim 27-acres of farmland next to the A4019 for the £46.7m project. It is part of a wider 102-acre site which can continue to be farmed, says Punchbowl.
The project will see £9.8m invested towards a new training centre for Gloucestershire Fire and Rescue Service. It will mean fire service staff no longer have to travel out of the county to Avonmouth.
A £2m share of the budget will also be used to improve training facilities at five strategic sites- Gloucester South , Cheltenham West, Chipping Campden, Cirencester and Coleford.
The site will also house a long-awaited new £15.7m highways depot, replacing a site in Bamfurlong which has been housed in rotting cabins for the last six years.
Alongside these will sit a £18.2m 80-bed care home, with a small parcel of land sold off for a development of around 25 new homes.
Cllr Colin Hay, deputy leader and cabinet member for finance, assets and transformation, said:
“These three services really need a place to go. The depot for highways that is currently being used is simply not fit for purpose. They’ve been promised a new place for years, and we’re going to deliver that at Coombe Hill.”
GCC highway maintenance services have four operational areas and five depots across the county.
A report into the Coombe Hill scheme said the new hub will replace the Northern area’s Bamfurlong base which has been squeezed into temporary cabins since 2029.
It said: “The current cabins being used for office accommodation are no longer fit for purpose.
They lack adequate space, have no meeting rooms, suffer from structural issues such as rotten floors and non-compliant staircases, and are poorly insulated – resulting in frozen pipes in the winter and excessive heat in the summer which has led to staff being advised to work from home.”
There is also insufficient space for storing essential materials meaning winter maintenance activities cannot be carried out by the team.
(Picture: Gloucestershire County Council)
