Eco-village for the future unveiled near Whitchurch
A futuristic 'eco-village' has been unveiled as one developer's £16 million vision for land outside Whitchurch.
The 'Village of Spaces' on 7.8 acres of land would include homes with grass roofs and its own power station.
Artist's impressions have been released of the project, which is the subject of talks with Shropshire Council.
It is designed to act as a new community and would include a village hall, shop, cafe and a district biomass combined heat and power plant.
The project was today unveiled by Tensteps Developments and has been designed by Ellesmere-based eco-architectural practice, Greenspace Architects.
Neither firm will confirm exactly where they hope to create the village, which would have 72 homes.
No planning application has been submitted for the development, because it sits outside planning areas designated for housing.
But pre-application talks have been held with planning officers and the site has been submitted for consideration in the latest review of Shropshire Council's local plan.
Josh Phipps, owner of Tensteps Properties, said that while the development is a concept, he is hopeful that it will go ahead.
He said: "Shropshire is a green county and it should be a green county for green projects, design and green companies. We do not want to build boxes, we want to push the envelope for design in the area."
Mr Phipps said that the design had focused on creating spaces for families to grow into.
He said: "There is an emphasis on all the spaces being quite big, so that families can grow into that. They can buy for life and stay there.
"I want to change the way we build and design things in this country. I want more personal design rather than a "one house fits all" approach. That does not work. When we design for an area it should be unique to that area."
Project architect James Bennett said the development had received a positive reaction from council planning officers.
He said: "They said 'to be honest we have not seen anything like that come into the council offices". It would be quite a landmark development.'
"We have a lot of green roofs to prevent water run-off. There would be a combined heating and power unit that would provide heat and power for the development and hopefully a nearby school."
