A controversial and long-delayed plan to build up to 120 houses beside a Herefordshire town could finally get the go-ahead next week.
Gladman Developments of Cheshire sought outline permission in early 2019 to build the estate on two sloping fields totalling nearly five hectares between the A44 and Pencombe Lane immediately west of Bromyard.
The plan for the site, known as Flaggoners Green, would require a new roundabout on the A44, which would also serve the larger planned Hardwick Bank development to the north.
The area along the hedgerow between the two fields would be retained as public green space, which would extend to the south of the site along Pencombe Lane, where a play area and a sizeable pond would be created.
A new footway to the south would meanwhile lead to the nearby Queen Elizabeth High School and on to the town centre.
Access was among the reasons a similar previous bid by the developer was refused in 2018.
Even earlier proposals had been refused in 2015, in part due to “unacceptable landscape impacts”, and a subsequent appeal dismissed by a government planning inspector in 2016.
A resubmitted plan was later held up by Herefordshire Council’s legal obligation not to add to water pollution in the river Lugg catchment – which can now be overcome by the developer buying nutrient credits worth £207,480 under a recently introduced council scheme.
But Bromyard town council remains opposed to the scheme, citing an independent report which concluded it was “highly unlikely that safe and suitable access to the site can be achieved for all users”.
Among nearly 70 letters of objection from the public, Mark Whitehorn also claimed: “There is simply not enough width on the A44 to provide safe pedestrian and traffic access,” nor was there enough room for a standard-width footway along Panniers Lane.
The bid has now been passed to the council’s planning committee of councillors to determine next Wednesday (October 25).
In his report for the meeting, planning officer Ollie Jones recommends approval, given that the suitability of the spot for residential development “has not previously been disputed”, and that official consultees have no outstanding issues with the road and pedestrian connections.
If outline permission is granted this time, the details of forms and layout of the houses, including those which will be made affordable, will follow in a later application.
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