The body, a wholly-owned subsidiary of the States, was established in July 2023 with the aim of developing the section of coast stretching from the site of the former aquarium in St Peter Port to Vale Castle, with a specific focus on St Sampson’s and St Peter Port harbours.
Its remit includes the provision of improved infrastructure in areas including flood defence, housing, transport, business and retail.
GDA chairman Peter Watson, founder and CEO of Vets4Pets, who has more than 45 years of business experience across industries including retail, urban development and waste management, described the project as ‘a bit of a jigsaw’, but ‘hugely exciting’.
‘I think it would be truly transformational,’ he said.
‘However, we need the backing politically.’
A public engagement survey undertaken by the GDA in December 2023 found that 70% of the more than 1,120 respondents thought the east coast needed change, with the creation of private housing, the transport of people or goods and improving the balance of traffic and pedestrian spaces all identified as key priorities.
The GDA has aimed to reflect these priorities in its plans.
‘The survey was done to try to kill off the keyboard warriors and NIMBYs, so that we could say “you might not like it, but 70% of the population does like it”,’ Mr Watson said.
‘We need to try and get away from NIMBY-ism. When you look at the amount of money we’ve spent on infrastructure compared to somewhere like Jersey over the last few years, it’s pathetic.
‘We had the airport in 1999, the QEII Marina in 1989, the harbour in 1853 and John Doyle in 1806 joining the two islands, that’s it for the major infrastructure projects that Guernsey has undertaken.’
He said so far the GDA had received an initial grant from the States of about £1.6m., with much of its initial focus looking at the development of St Sampson’s due to the scale of work that would need to take place there.
‘We thought that’s where the greatest opportunity would be. There isn’t anything you can do in St Sampson’s that doesn’t make it better.’
However, he said much of the impetus to move the project forward was going to need to come from government.
‘The difficulty currently is that you talk to developers and they’re so cynical of the States, so they go “when you’ve actually got a spade in the ground then we’ll believe it’s happening”. I think there’s a healthy dose of cynicism, which to be honest you can understand.
‘We need to develop as many partnerships as we can between the public and private sector, and we really need our deputies to help us with some of the key moves, because much of it is going to have to come from public money.’
He said it was too early to put a price tag on the entire cost of the project, but estimated that, should everything eventually go ahead, it would take two decades to complete.
‘This is a 20-year project, even if you got the money tomorrow.’
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