Someone may know something – maybe.

I met Councillor Brian Underwood at a seasonal get together with the board of Stevenage Homes just before Christmas. He is one of the local councillors for Bedwell, which is the ward The Towers is in.

He is also on the town’s Planning and Development Committee so if any one knows what is happening with the Stevenage Town Centre Regeneration scheme, you would expect it to be him.

He could not give any firmer date for the demolition of The Towers than the 5 years minimum that was given to us by Stevenage Homes. But he did say that Stevenage Borough Council are going to bring forward new plans soon with fewer apartments.

How this will affect the overall regeneration scheme is unclear. As I understand it, the first stage of the scheme was to be the building of a luxury apartment complex at the south end of the shopping precinct, where The Towers now stands. The sale of these properties was going to finance the regeneration of the rest of the Town Centre. This is the ‘public interest’ justification for the compulsory purchase order on our homes.

Councillor Underwood also said that the Her Majesty’s Revenue and Customs (HMRC) decision to stay in Southgate House has no affect on the regeneration scheme as the redevelopment was never going to include this building.

We chatted about how the credit crunch had affected other developments in the town. He said that recently completed apartments were not selling. With housing associations making up a significant proportion of the few sales that there have been. Something I have heard from several sources now.

Hardly surprising, even if people can get a mortgage, most are holding off buying in the expectation that prices will continue to fall.

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