Dwellings Approved on Greenfield Land
We recently secured planning consent from Tendring District Council for 50 new dwellings on greenfield land on the outskirts of Great Bentley in Essex.
We were able to demonstrate that Tendring District Council has no 5 year housing land supply and that their Local Plan was not up-to-date in the consideration of this case. Great Bentley has been identified in the emerging local plan as a Key Rural Service Centre, capable of delivering additional housing. Whilst this emerging policy only carried limited in the decision making of this case, it was clear that the Council considered this a sustainable settlement that could absorb some development growth. Consequently, we established that the principle of a residential development could be deemed acceptable at this location, provided that the benefits of the proposed scheme outweighed any harm.
There were some technical matters that needed to be resolved, for example, Great Bentley has a unique character centred around its 17 hectare Village Green and a Conservation Area. We used contextual analysis to demonstrate that the proposed scheme would not harm this historic asset or to the wider context. A number of specialist reports also formed part of the planning application submission relating to matters such as, archaeology and ecology that demonstrated that there were no site specific issues that would prevent housing from coming forward at this location.
The National Planning Policy Framework establishes that where there are no relevant development plan policies, or the policies which are most important for determining the application are out-of-date, planning permission should be granted unless there are any adverse impacts of doing so would significantly outweigh the benefits, when assessed against the policies in the NPPF, taken as a whole.
Our evidence and analysis established that the tilted balance weighed in favour of this scheme and that it would represent sustainable development and an important windfall site that would boost local housing land supply and contribute to the reduction in the current shortfall in provision.
We are pleased that Tendring District Council agreed and approved the planning application.
If you have a development project and would like planning and/or architectural advice, please contact us at mail@adpltd.co.uk