Gap between village and town 'only 250 yards due to homes decision'

A Leicestershire housing scheme will result in "just 250 yards" of space between a village and a neighbouring town, a councillor has claimed. A plan for 160 homes on land around Three Ways Farm in Melton Road, in Queniborough, was given tentative approval by Charnwood Borough Council’s plans committee at a meeting last Thursday.

Ward councillor Sandra Woodward told the meeting the village had only been allocated 155 houses in the borough’s local plan - which sets out where properties can be built - but that more than 500 homes were already either recently approved or under construction. Concerns were raised over the separation between Queniborough and neighbouring village East Goscote, but Councillor Woodward pointed out that building on the land in question would also mean there would be "continuous housing" between the village and nearby Syston, resulting in only 250 yards of green space separating the two.

However, David Pendle, representing applicant Hallam Land Management, told the committee the 160 homes were "much needed", and would be on a site the borough council had itself identified for development in the local plan. He said that although the separation between Queniborough and East Goscote was a "hot topic", the developer had "worked very closely with [the council's] officers to incorporate a significant area of land to the north that is to be landscaped and left free from development, providing new woodland, trees and hedges", which he claimed would "further strengthen the separation between Queniborough and East Goscote.

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Both Queniborough and East Goscote Parish Councils had opposed the plans, while 253 separate objections had been submitted, along with a letter of objection signed by 270 residents. Councillor Stephen Wright, of Queniborough Parish Council, told committee members that the parish council objected to the scheme for many reasons, including lack of school places, difficulty in obtaining doctors’ appointments, overdevelopment of the area and traffic. “There would be over 300 vehicles turning onto this already busy road and we are worried with the traffic along this road currently exceeding 50mph with children walking to school at Wreake Valley college," he said.

Coun Wright added that the number of new homes previously approved was "just ridiculous for our small village to take”. He added: “I know houses need to be built, but in a small village we just cannot accommodate more houses and traffic.” More than 100 houses were also approved at Queniborough Lodge at the same meeting.

Councillor Julie Palmer said the impact by the new homes on local services would be "quite large". “They can’t cope with this extra housing, and the area of local separation is going to be really small and so won’t really be an area of local separation at all," she said. "There’s many reasons why this planning application should be refused.”

However, a report prepared by planning officers revealed inspectors who had dealt with three recent planning appeals against previous decisions made by the borough council had concluded some of the authority's planning policies were out of date. This meant the council now had a higher bar to overcome when refusing applications for new homes. The site has also been allocated for housing in the evolving local plan, which will run up to 2037 once approved, which in itself poses an obstacle to the plan being refused.

Branding it a “complicated decision”, Councillor David Infield said: “I note that only a very small proportion of the expected number of primary school children would be able to attend the local school, so they would have to travel along a busy main road. This doesn’t seem to be necessarily the most healthy thing to expose our children to.”

But Councillor Hilary Fryer said: “On reading through all the reports and listening to the officers, I find no planning grounds to refuse this application.”

As the council is still waiting for National Highways, Severn Trent Water and Leicestershire County Council's highways team to respond to the application, the committee voted to delegate the granting of planning permission to the head of planning so the scheme could be given official planning approval once the outstanding responses had been received. The motion was passed with seven votes in favour, two against and one abstention.

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