During a Public Accounts Committee hearing, John Rogers, director-general of the Growth, Housing and Environment Department, said that he believed past planning decisions had been ‘peculiar’ and had contributed to the problems the landmark facility continues to
face.
Concerns have grown over the future of the Fort recently, with Senator Steve Pallett warning that its ageing infrastructure needs to be replaced to stop it having to be closed.
During the hearing, Jersey Property Holdings director Ray Foster said that work carried out by the HOK Group in 2014 to establish potential improvements, such as a new lift system and skyway from Snow Hill, and future uses for the Fort had been useful, but a lack of funding had prevented further action been taken.
‘I was very proud of that piece of work. It showed that there is an opportunity to recapture [the Fort’s status] as the essential heart of the Island as a facility,’ he said.
‘The difficulty with dealing with the Fort, as well as its inherent structural problems, is accessibility. One of the themes of the paper was to explore means of getting people to and from the Fort in a manner which is interesting and cost effective.
‘In short, the scheme fell away because it was at a time when funds were tight and utilised for other priorities.’
Mr Rogers said that he believed that Jersey Property Holdings, which is responsible for the States property portfolio, had been underfunded and that had contributed to the Fort’s problems.
‘JPH has been a poor cousin in terms of resource allocation and [it] has been too easy to allow properties to fall into disrepair,’ he said.
‘We have been through lots of savings programmes and it tends to be easier to make savings on fixed assets than it does on people. But the long-term effect is you can end up in real trouble.
‘An example is we are currently demolishing the cable car station at Fort Regent. It is has been more than 20 years that we have left it there. Can you give me a single reason for doing that apart from a lack of foresight? We are
doing it now at great expense.’
He added that he believed the Fort had been placed in an even worse situation by poor planning decisions.
‘There has been peculiar decisions made. The decision to build a leisure centre on the Waterfront was the beginning of the end for the Fort because the swimming baths were closed,’ he said.
‘Stopping the cable car and decommissioning that without an alternative was also part of the end. Without that accessibility and a future plan for the next 50 years, there are going to be real challenges for the Fort.’
