WORK could soon begin on a £35 million new retail and business park on the edge of Wellington as the developer asks Somerset Council to approve some of the detail of its plans as time runs out to make a start on the development.

The new commercial and retail park will include two restaurants, electric vehicle charging points, and business units for both industrial and services use, and could take five years to finish.

Taunton-based Chelston Heath LLP has only until next month before its three-year-old planning permission expires.

Outline plans were approved on July 11, 2023, for the Chelston Heath development, which could create 230 jobs on 9.4 acres of land on the West Buckland side of the Chelston to M5 motorway link road.

Now, the company has applied for details of the layout, scale, appearance, and landscaping of the site to be approved as per conditions attached to its 2023 permission, which would allow another two years to make a start on site.

The council previously approved splitting the development into four phases, also as per the conditions.

The firm proposes an imminent start on phase one, which it aims to have completed by the end of September.

But, the second phase would not start for another 18 months until early 2028, with its completion a year later in the first quarter of 2029.

Phase three would take two years from 2029 to the end of March, 2031, with the fourth and final phase starting mid-way in that timeframe to also complete at the same time in 2031.

Chelston Heath LLP has engaged CarneySweeney as a planning consultant, the same firm which has been acting for developers who want to build several hundred homes off Wardleworth Way, in the Tonedale area of the town, and another site behind Wellington’s Lidl supermarket.