Stop gentrification in Fishponds! Make Atlas Place 50% social housing

Bristol is in a deep housing crisis. Rents have risen by more than 60%, averaging over 45% of incomes. Higher interest rates have made mortgages more expensive while house prices have stayed sky high.

Social housing provides homes to those who can least afford them, and takes the heat out of the housing market for everyone else. Debt-fuelled, profit-seeking private developments only push up prices further. If private developers really thought increasing housing supply would bring down prices, they wouldn’t build. Only social housing can permanently keep our neighbourhood affordable for everyone.

Bristol City Council have so far failed to hold the developers to their 30% target for affordable housing, let alone a more ambitious 50%. For the one site granted planning approval, they have let the developer off with only 22% affordable housing.

Graphic Packaging International Ltd propose 252 homes, of which 16.5% would be social housing and 5.5% shared ownership. The Council has granted planning permission and demolition of the old factory has begun. The company plans to sell the site to developers once it is demolished. This could be an opportunity for a housing association to take on the site, making the development fully social. Or the site could be sold to a profit-driven company that attempts to reduce the amount of affordable housing even further. 

Central Fishponds Ltd propose to build no social housing and only 5% shared ownership on their Filwood House and Verona House site. They hope to build up to 380 homes. Bristol City Council are currently considering their planning application – you can still comment. The Council must reject this contemptuous proposal. The developers must go back to the drawing board and make a meaningful offer to build social housing.

Castel Ltd have yet to announce whether they will build social or shared ownership housing on their ‘Timber Mills’ development. In total they propose to build 1 600 homes. They ran some community consultation events in March 2025 but have yet to submit a planning application. Castel Ltd must make an ambitious social housing offer in the region of 50% of planned development.

Graphic Packaging International Ltd has had a factory in Fishponds for years, which it has now moved to Yate. It is owned by a US holding company traded on the New York Stock Exchange and valued at over $5 billion. The US parent company is registered in tax haven state Delaware.

Central Fishponds Ltd is owned by Lebanese businessman El Mouhtaz El Sawaf via a holding company in Luxembourg, a tax haven.

Castel Ltd is owned by the Crocker family who have a portfolio of property developments in Bristol. The business is registered in Guernsey, another tax haven.

More information

Fishponds Community Planning Group post regular updates on their meetings with developers on their Facebook page

Filwood Verona development website and the Filwood Verona planning application

Graphics Packaging International outline planning application – granted April 2025

Fishpond Voice article on Filwood Verona development (2025)

Bristol Cable article on the developments (2023)

The three developers collaborated on a masterplan, dubbing the three sites ‘Atlas Place’. The Atlas Place website seems to be down already, last internet archive save is from Jan 2025.