Plans to expand Herefordshire business park approved

Plans to expand a Herefordshire business park, potentially creating up to 100 jobs, have been approved.

The outline plan for a 1.4-hectare paddock at Whitestone Business Park, alongside the A4103 Hereford-Worcester road, was to create space for ten mixed-size units for commercial, industrial, storage and distribution uses.

The business park is already “one of the largest single employment bases outside of Hereford and the market towns” – but “is fully occupied, and several existing tenants are actively seeking larger units”, according to the application put forward in January by Mr P Collins.

Planning officer Adam Lewis considered the scheme to be “well positioned, and will be experienced as a logical extension of Whitestone Business Park”, yet it would be screened by mature boundary trees which would be retained.

Addressing local concerns, the applicant had offered upgrades to local roads “to facilitate safe pedestrian access to the village of Withington”, he added.

Under the approval, the units’ hours of use, including deliveries and dispatch, will be limited to between 7am and 6pm weekdays and 8am to 4pm Saturdays, with no use on Sundays or bank holidays.

Any noise-generating equipment or external lighting would also have to be separately approved by the council.

A further application covering the design details of the scheme, including internal roads and parking, will still need to be approved.

This is not the first use proposed for the site. Piper Homes was refused planning permission for a 33-home estate there in May 2022, while an earlier permission to build 80 “extra care” flats lapsed in 2018.