Business

McLean's bookies file plans for 49-unit apartment complex in east Belfast

The location on the Holywood Road is currently home to offices and warehouses and is in a primarily residential district
The location on the Holywood Road is currently home to offices and warehouses and is in a primarily residential district The location on the Holywood Road is currently home to offices and warehouses and is in a primarily residential district

LEADING bookmaker McLeans has filed plans to build a 49-unit apartment complex in east Belfast.

Initial blueprints for the development show two separate apartment blocks, one five-storeys high and another at four-storeys, which will stand at the site on the Holywood Road.

The location is currently home to offices and warehouses and is in a primarily residential district, with rows of houses surrounding the location on two sides.

The property will also be accompanied by communal gardens and 50 car parking spaces for its potential residents. Plans also show communal rooftop terraces atop each structure.

Although the apartment complex is only in its initial stages of development, it has already hit something of a speed-bump.

According to a consultation response from Belfast City Council’s environmental health department, the proposed location is close to a patch of "contaminated land".

"Records held by this service would indicate that the site of the proposed development is located in close proximity to a land use type that would have the potential to contaminate land and poise a risk to human health," they wrote.

The department advised the developers that a preliminary risk assessment, including a detailed site investigation, be carried out before the project can move forward.

The man behind the development is Paul McLean, who currently operates the McLean’s Bookmakers chain alongside his brother Sam. The pair took over control of the business following the death of their father and the company’s founder Alfie in 2006.

This is not the first time Mr McLean has attempted to develop the land on the Holywood Road, however. Council document’s show plans for a similar apartment complex being put forward on two previous occasions.

In 2007 blueprints for a 64-unit complex were filed, before being withdrawn by Mr McLean some months later for unknown reasons.

The following year, designs for a 50-unit construction were put forward. Planning permission was subsequently granted by the council, but they never came to fruition.

On both occasions, objections to the proposed developments were formally filed with the council by neighbouring residents of the site.

The McLean family are not new players in the property game. In 2008 they paid nearly £21 million for the Scottish Provident Building on Donegall Square, one of Belfast’s oldest and most recognisable buildings.

McLean’s Bookmakers currently have more than 60 premises across the north and are the region’s most popular betting shops.

Plans for the Holywood Road site are currently under consideration by the council, with further clearance and consultations ahead before final permission can be granted.