Joyland Books

THANET council is to consider plans to purchase part of the Dreamland site in Margate compulsorily, to ensure it reopens as a heritage amusement park.

The costs of pursuing a compulsory purchase order (CPO), an expensive legal purchase allowing councils to take over land or properties, will be discussed on Thursday.

The £12 million project for a heritage theme park on the Margate seafront site was bailed out by the council in April after the site's owner Margate Town Centre Regeneration Company (MTCRC) said it could not pay its £4 million share of the costs.

Thanet council agreed to pay the shortfall and as part of the deal will buy the site for a peppercorn cost of £1, and hand it over to the Dreamland Trust.

A July date for the land transfer passed without negotiations reaching a conclusion and Thanet council is keen to try and keep to the scheduled opening date of 2012.

Other areas for discussion include what sort of compensation the council might receive if they go ahead with the CPO and the value of the land.

There is still the opportunity for the land to be transferred without a compulsory purchase.

Toby Hunter, MTCRC's project coordinator, said: "We are still working towards a transfer of the land but the date is less certain. There has been a slippage but nothing has been derailed."

Mr Hunter added that the company planned to submit a planning application for houses, shops and a hotel on part of the site in spring.

The Dreamland Trust is shortly to make a decision about which rides will be restored first.

porf wrote:
Whilst I'm aware it's a case of the Dreamland Trust working in co-operation with a group of willing partners including TDC and MTCRC I can't help feel that it doesn't always seem that way. From a personal viewpoint and taking in to account that we are now around 4 months past the original suggested transfer date and with no current expected transfer date it almost looks as if one or more of the partners aren't as willing or as happy with the transfer as originally indicated.

The transfer of the land is the single biggest risk to the project and delays could jeopardise the Sea Change and HLF funding. This has been covered, in part, above. If an agreement cannot be reached by the end of July, the Council should commence CPO procedures. It is likely that this would delay the project by 12 – 18 months. In these circumstances, we would need to re-negotiate the conditions of the Sea Change funding which needs to be spent or committed by March 2011. The Sea Change team is aware of this option and will be kept informed of progress.

There is also a potential tension between the density of housing development on the enabling land that may be acceptable to the Council as local planning authority and the density required by the developer to fund the financial contributions to the project and any necessary on and off site infrastructure works - and still make a profit. Indeed, it is to address the possibility that the Company might try to improve its prospects of obtaining planning permission for a higher density development by delaying the voluntary transfer of the Cinema site and Heritage Park footprint land, that authority is sought for the making of a compulsory purchase order.