A former car park in Helston could be turned into flats for older residents of Helston, the Helston Packet can reveal.

Coastline Housing has confirmed it is looking to build 22 flats on the site of the former Quarry Car Park, off Tyacke Road.

These would include one and two bedroom apartments for affordable rent, including two specially designed to be suitable for wheelchair users.

A spokesman for the housing association confirmed that the scheme would also include dedicated parking and gardens for residents.

Karen Goldup, development manager at Coastline, said: “We are very pleased to have this opportunity to bring more much-needed older persons’ housing to Helston, and significantly improve a site that has become neglected in recent years.”

The car park has had a chequered history in recent years. Once a large, free parking area that was well used by many people working in the town, this changed almost overnight when travellers moved onto the land for a number of years.

A traveller ‘village’ was set up, with a makeshift road sign pointing to "1-3 Quarry Parc" even placed at the entrance, before Cornwall Council took back control of the car park in April last year and access to it was blocked up with large boulders.

Coastline now has a conditional contract with Cornwall Council, which has put the land up for sale, meaning the housing association will complete the purchase if the scheme goes ahead.

Members of the public will be able to find out more about the plans at a consultation event this coming Tuesday, running from 3.30pm until 5.45pm at the Old Cattle Market, which is open to anyone to drop into.

The association intends to then submit a planning application for the scheme in August.

Coastline has described the challenges it faces over housing as “enormous,” with thousands of families registered for affordable rented housing in the county.

The association has secured more than £10 million of grant funding from the Homes and Communities Agency to develop more than 300 new homes in Cornwall over the next three years, and said it was always on the lookout for development sites in the county where more affordable housing can be built.

A smaller scale scheme for elderly people, which saw the association hoping to build five homes at Beacon Parc, failed earlier this year after existing residents set up a campaign protesting against the resulting loss of the grass area next to their play equipment.

At the time a representative of Coastline said that moving elderly tenants into the one-bedroom bungalows would free up the three and four-bedroomed homes they had been living in, for families in the area.