'Stan Florent: erection of 6 luxury villas causes controversy'

A new public controversy is brewing in Corsica amid a real estate problem. This one has turned to the commune of Saint-Florent: the "Cathedral Gardens" project involves the construction of six luxury villas of about 150 square meters each with a swimming pool on a plot of just over 3,000 square meters near the Cathedral of Nebbia.

Some construction photos posted on social media have sparked a growing controversy. First of all, the price of the villas is criticized. The political parties Femu a Corsica and Core in Fronte have expressed their position on the issue. "In a context where many Corsicans cannot find housing at reasonable prices, Core in Fronte believes that this real estate project is inappropriate." The Femu a Corsica party believes that "this project is not''intended for Corsicans'." But the project's developer denies these claims: 'Of the six villas, three have been sold to Corsicans'.

But on an island where house prices have long reached unprecedented heights, there is another counter-version - patrimonial and cultural. The construction of this village of villas is on land to be developed, close to the 12th-century Nebbia Cathedral, which is a historical monument. But the population and political parties are asking the question: how could French architects and public services authorize this project? "Often architects in charge of buildings require authorization to build windows and terraces in villages, and here, next to a historic monument we should use this as an example so that we don't repeat it elsewhere',''explains Jean-Baptiste Arena of Core in Fronte.

While we have not received a response from the Architect of Buildings of France, the law requires the consent of the Architect of Buildings of France (ABF) within 500 meters of a historic monument. Like all other services, the ABF gave a favorable opinion, but with some conditions: "everything was done according to the rules, this project started three or four years ago, with a long work that was done with the ABF, which basically put all the restrictions on us for this project. There were restrictions on materials and also on the height of the villas," explains the project developer.

The heart of the patrimonial controversy was the presence of 28 strictly aligned pillars on the land, forming an avenue.''At first there was a theory that it was related to the thousand-year-old Cathedral of Nebbia, which is only a hundred meters away, but it turned out that a study by the World Association for National Research and Archaeology (INRAP) dated them to the 20th century, based on aerial photographs taken between 1912 and 1960. The first photo shows only the vineyards of the famous Poggi wine, while the second shows the pillars. "These structures do not appear to have the age attributed to them," the document points out.

The construction project is also provoking opposition reactions in the city of St. Florent. According to Juliette Poncevera, member of the Assembly of Corsica and head of the local opposition council Fà Populu Inseme: "On the council of the city, we never know what happens in the field of urban planning, in the authorization''on construction, of course, the mayor is not obliged to inform us,' says the opposition municipal councillor, who supplements his words by saying: "since the last 15 years of building more and more haphazardly, it is secondary housing, closed ten months a year. Do we want this kind of development for our village?".

The Cathedral Gardens project may be discussed at the Nov. 10 St. Florent Town Council meeting.