More Student Halls In ‘Station Square’, Portsmouth

This month planning permission was given for another 256 student hall rooms, bringing the total number of planned new student halls in the area to 10.

The new hall will replace the Co-op Bank and Music Room in Commercial Road with a 19-storey tower, adding to the student zone which is growing around the town station which some now call 'Station Square" - Greetham St, James Watson Hall, Margaret Rule Hall plus new developments at Isambard Brunel Road, Zurich house and Surrey Street - bringing the potential halls places up from just under 3,000 a year ago, to somewhere nearer 8,000.

We have asked the University several times what they see as the optimum number of halls rooms but have yet to get an answer - our view is that they probably need around 7,000 to ensure they can provide rooms for any 1st year or international student who wants one, but it is interesting - whilst developers used to build halls 'to order" and in return the University would guarantee a certain level of occupancy, this has changed with so many developers getting in on the act, the University actually objected to this new tower at the planning meeting on the grounds that they had not been consulted.

Perhaps more important to us as local landlords is the view of a number of councillors that 'any student hall is good, as it frees up housing in Southsea for families". Whilst there may be an element of truth in this view, we would counter with several different perspectives:

• New housing developments are good, whether they are specifically for students or any other group - too much of the city is in need of regeneration and new developments such as these will help with that
• Even if another 2,000 student halls rooms are built on top of those planned and the University stops growing, that will still leave around 10-12 thousand students needing homes within the city, so private sector rented student accommodation is not going away.
• From a student perspective, everyone is different, but for many, the transition from home to halls to private accommodation is part of growing up and learning to be a good citizen. Add to that, the exorbitant cost of halls rooms and low investment in student education, the debt burden on young graduates can only be reduced by getting them out of halls into private sector accommodation. We think many would question the ethics of halls providers who minimise their investment and maximise their return at the expense of everyone else.
• Local residents are very worried about the creation of zones for students and are arguing for a mixed and balanced community. Somewhat ironic considering the same argument is used to reduce the number of HMO"s in any specific area.
• It was interesting at the HMO Licensing meeting (see other article), PCC raised concerns about the fact that some of the new halls are not licensed and as private HMO"s, they should be. We look forward to seeing enforcement action in this area....
• From a landlords perspective, many landlords have loans to repay and with increased taxation based on those loans, they will not be able to cover their costs if they let a former student HMO to a family, so more often than not, these properties will be offered to young professionals sharing (which will bring more cars into the area than students do) or if not of sufficient quality, the houses will be filled with those on benefits or parole or similar - not an issue for the landlord, but not quite the rosy, happy family image that some councillors hold.