Published on Saturday 10 March 2012 05:45
One of the most historic buildings in a Leeds suburb could be saved from the wrecking ball.
The grade II listed corn mill, in Horsforth, Leeds, was in such a bad state of repair that it was placed on Leeds Civic Trust’s Heritage at-risk register.
Developers of the Low Lane site, which already houses a complex of modern flats, planned to demolish the mill to create a new building in its place.
The YEP can reveal that planning officers from Leeds City Council are approaching developers to discuss plans to transform the historic building into a visitor centre.
Horsforth Civic Society chairman Martin Hughes said: “We would love to see the building fully restored but we realise the commercial implications of that are very considerable.
“Rather than seeing the building rot, we feel that a compromise would be necessary.
“We would like to see as much as possible of the original building retained and rebuilt.”
He said that the building needs to be raised because it is liable to flooding.
Last year the proposals to knock down the mill were met with fierce criticism.
President of Horsforth Historical Society and local councillor Chris Townsley (Lib Dem, Horsforth) said: “If the mill is transformed into a visitors’ centre that would be a brilliant idea.
“Instead of people taking from the area it would be some way of giving back.
“If the building goes then part of our history goes too.
“It is very important to retain that, and the corn mill was a very important asset many years ago.”
Horsforth was listed three times in the Domesday Book – a land survey from 1086 commissioned by William the Conqueror to assess the extent of the land and resources in the country.
The town was charged 30 shillings by the Crown, which was more than surrounding areas such as Rawdon, because of its two corn mills.
One of the mills was sited in Troy Road and the other is on Low Lane.
Comments
There are 3 comments to this article
I know an 8 year old who knows how to spell grammar (not grammer).
Maybe if we had more educational centres your spelling (and grammer) would not be at the same level as an 8 year old. Then your comment would have some gravitas instead of making you sound as inane as your premise.
last thing the locals want is a visitor centre people al hrs of the day traffic running over there kids ,just pull the old dump down ,wy spend thousands of leeds taxpayers money on this pile of rubbish ,get a life townsley !
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