Cardiff Council has approved a 33-storey, 400-room co-living tower for one of Cardiff’s busiest roads, clearing the way for a major new addition to the city centre skyline. The scheme, proposed by Watkin Jones Group, was backed at a planning meeting where councillors broadly welcomed the design.

The building is planned for a prominent site at the meeting point of Custom House Street, Bute Street and Hope Street, where the land has been unoccupied for a considerable period of time. Its approval matters now because it places a dense, residential-style development on a key city-centre corner in a move that will reshape how the area looks and functions.

Co-living blocks are designed around shared kitchens and living areas, with private ensuite bedrooms, and the company’s plans say the format is aimed at younger professionals or transient workers seeking furnished rooms, shared amenities and flexible terms. The Cardiff application says communal kitchens, terraces and a gym will be part of the scheme, while the council reports say the design will positively contribute to the surrounding urban fabric and create a new addition to the Cardiff skyline.

Councillors were generally supportive. Adrian Robson said the building would “stand out noticeably” from other structures nearby and described its appearance as “deep green”. Jon Shimmin said it would “stick out very deliberately… I love that,” while Sean Driscoll said, “The design is great, I do like the building,” adding that the council tax revenue would be “more than welcome.”

But the plans ran into resistance over cycling provision. The proposal includes 241 cycle spaces, and planning reports said that amounts to about 60% of the required level. Shimmin said that if the city wants to encourage more cycling, then developments of this size need more secure storage, and Peter Wong said bluntly: “That is it doesn’t provide the required provision.” He also accused officers of using past failures to secure minimum standards as a precedent for continuing to do so.

Kenneth Reid said cycle storage use would be monitored under the application’s travel plan, but the approval leaves one question still open: when construction will actually begin. For now, Cardiff has signed off on a tower that will change a long-empty corner of the centre, even as the gap between promised and required cycle space remains unresolved.