Shrewsbury's Dana Prison: Fate could be decided next month

Owners of the site in Shrewsbury said they no longer plan to appeal to Government planning inspectors over the future of the prison, but instead hope it will be decided by Shropshire Council during July.

Trevor Osborne of the Osborne Group, one of the owners of the prison, hopes to turn the historic building into student accommodation, private flats, a health club, cafe, restaurant and a walled garden.

Mr Osborne said last month he was considering asking a planning inspectorate to make a decision on the plans after issues surrounding parking seemed to delay the local authority.

Today, he said: "We won't be doing that now because we had some good meetings this week which has put everything in perspective.

"The very excellent transport expert at the council seems to be coming to agree with our transport expert as well."

A number of concerns were raised about the application, with some worried about the number of parking spaces being earmarked.

Officers and councillors feared it would have a knock-on impact on parking locally.

But Mr Osborne said: "It is realised that the traffic it will create will be no greater than when it was used as a prison. It must be compared with its last use, not now it is vacant.

"Although even now thousands of people have gone on the tours and looked around the prison.

"We are now hopeful that the application will come before the committee in July.

"This is of course an outline application for change of use.

"Then we will need to go and get the full details together."

The plans were initially submitted to Shropshire Council in January and Mr Osborne said that despite things hopefully moving along, work will not be expected to start for a number of months.

He said: "We also need to see a few more students enrolling into the satellite college to make sure there is sufficient demand and then we will need to programme it to make sure we come on line when they start."