Westgate One Student Block Keeps 43 Extra Rooms

The Westgate One student block on St Peter’s Street in Canterbury can keep 43 more rooms than it was given permission for. Canterbury City Council granted retrospective planning permission on Friday 9 October.

The block, at 28-30 St Peter’s Street and running back to Pound Lane, had permission for 143 student rooms. It now has 186. The decision was made by a planning officer under delegated powers, not by the planning committee. Source: the council’s planning register entry for CA/25/01013.

How 143 rooms became 186

The site is the former Barretts showroom, next to the Westgate Towers. Its planning history, set out in the officer’s report, runs like this:

The owners’ planning statement, by Goddard Planning, explains the change. After “considering market conditions”, the owners split each of the large studios in the Freeman Block, which fronts Pound Lane, into two. Each new studio is of “similar floor area” to the others in the building.

The statement accepts that splitting the rooms needed planning permission, and that “that sub-division has occurred”. The application asked the council to regularise it. The outside of the building has not changed.

What the council weighed

The officer’s report recommended approval. Its main points:

• Rooms: they range from 19 to 35.7 square metres, “similar to some of the room sizes approved” before.
• Cars: the block stays car-free under a legal agreement, so the report finds no extra impact on air quality. The corner of St Peter’s Street and St Peter’s Place is inside the city’s air quality management area.
• Cycling and drop-offs: an updated travel plan provides 118 cycle spaces and says how five drop-off spaces will be managed.
• Stodmarsh: the extra rooms mean extra wastewater. Water-saving fittings across all 186 rooms are meant to offset it, and the council’s assessment found no harm to the protected Stodmarsh lakes.
• Open space: the courtyards do not meet the full requirement, so a contribution will be collected through the community infrastructure levy.

Who raised concerns

Two neighbours objected. Their concerns, as listed in the report, included:

• a “material intensification of use”
• more traffic, deliveries and refuse collections, and risks to pedestrians and cyclists
• more noise
• more pressure on water, drainage and waste systems
• a call to review the Section 106 payments agreed for the earlier scheme

Kent County Council’s highways team raised concerns too. It said the plans differed from those approved, that the delivery vehicle turning space did not work, and that the cycle numbers and student management plan needed updating. The report says the updated travel plan answered these points.

Councillor Pip Hazleton welcomed the move of the main entrance and reception, and accepted that the extra rooms would not add pressure on sewers and drainage. The Canterbury Heritage Design Forum did not object or support. It said it could not comment on the increase without an analysis of the bed spaces approved before.

The conditions

The decision notice carries 22 conditions. They include:

• the rooms are for full-time students at Canterbury’s universities and colleges only
• the water-saving measures must be fitted before the rooms are occupied
• the site management plan and travel plan must be followed
• sound insulation for rooms with windows facing Pound Lane

What it means for you

• For neighbours on Pound Lane and St Peter’s Street: the building looks the same, but up to 43 more students can live in it. Concerns about how the block is run go to the operator first, and suspected planning breaches to the council’s planning enforcement team.
• Can it be challenged? Only the applicant can appeal a planning decision. A judicial review of a decision has to be brought within six weeks.
• To read the papers yourself: the report, the objections and the drawings are on the planning register under CA/25/01013. Our planning applications page explains how to search it.

Sources

• Canterbury City Council, planning application CA/25/01013: officer’s report and decision notice, 9 October 2026
• Goddard Planning for the owners, planning statement, June 2025