Councillors have given support for up to 17 new beach huts in Littlehampton.
Up to 17 huts could be built to the west of existing huts – and interspersed between them – on Littlehampton’s seafront. Under a new policy, all the huts would be offered to residents in the Arun District.
According to Arun District Council officers, ‘beach huts remain in high demand’ and the authority now operates a closed waiting list.
A previous application for 20 beach huts, made by the council, was refused in April last year.
This was mainly because the proposed huts did not have accessibility features and could have ‘blocked visas to the sea’, according to the council’s then development control committee.
As a result, ADC’s economy committee said a proportion of the newly proposed huts ‘must be accessible’.
Opposition leader James Walsh (LDem, Beach) said: “If we’re going to be putting in new beach huts, we are supposed to be compliant with the disabled access legislation that exists at the current time – not some time in the future.”
Samantha-Jayne Staniforth (Con, Orchard) asked: “Why are we having to wait again, why is the disabled community being pushed back on this again?”
The council’s director of place, Karl Roberts said that none of Littlehampton’s 80 beach huts are currently accessible.
Emily Seex (Arun Ind, River) did not support the new huts as she said a ‘solid wall’ of them would ruin views.
But Tony Dixon (Ind, Aldwick East) called for there to be no more delays, saying that accessibility could be built into ‘the next phase’.
“If we had made a decision, we could actually have seen some income this year from this,” he said.
Councillor Staniforth praised the use of recycled materials in the proposed beach huts, but she wanted to know if the council could make enough money from the exercise.
Each beach hut made from 98 per cent recycled materials costs the council £10,363. The estimated total project cost for 17 huts, without accessibility features, is £185,671, which means it could take the council at least nine years to break even. 17 standard beach huts would bring in a total of £370,961 over a 15 year period.
Officers will now go back to the drawing board to see how many larger, accessible huts they can accommodate, which may mean fewer huts overall. All new huts will also need planning permission before they are built so may not appear on the seafront until at least the end of this year.
Paul Broggi, ADC’s property, estates and facilities manager, said a meeting with CEO James Hassett made it clear he wanted to see ‘170 beach huts not 17’.
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