Plans to return a former mill site in Keighley to industrial use have been approved

Devonshire Mills was built in 1909 as one of the town’s many industrial buildings.

But the mill was demolished in 2005, and the site on West Lane has remained empty since.

This Summer an application to build two industrial units on a section of the site was submitted to Bradford Council by Keighley based building company Terra Firma.

The plans would create 640 square metres of employment space, but the application shows the vast majority of the site would “remain unchanged.”

Four people had objected to the plans, claiming the site should be used for housing, and claiming “no thought had been given” to the fact there was a school across the road.

Three people wrote to the Council supporting the plans, saying the work would tidy up a site that had been empty for two decades.

Approving the scheme last week, planners said: “Employment use of the site is established and acceptable in principle and the proposal does not raise significant concerns regarding impact on visual or residential amenity, highway safety, drainage biodiversity or any other planning-related matter.”

One condition of the approval is that the units can only open between 7am and 8pm.