Have JCB dropped a spanner in the Council’s plans?
As close observers of planning applications* in Derbyshire Dales will have noticed, there has been a significant addition to the documents associated with a major application for a total of 469 homes on the old airfield site near Ashbourne. This is application 19/01274/FUL and its subsequent incarnations put forward by the developers Harrisons with David Wilson Homes / Barratt Homes.
Plans to build homes on the site have been long established and form part of the Local Plan. However the changes made last year to increase numbers by over 100 and also to not ensure that appropriate infrastructure was secured before the homes were built, have caused some concern.
The latest submission of documents from Bamford Property Limited (the owner of the northern part of the old airfield) appears to take issue with the current design of the development on the grounds that it impacts their access to and development of their own land which lies to the north of the 'Phase 1' site.
JCB have in the past used their site as a 'testing and proving facility in connection with its construction manufacturing business'. They have used Ladyhole Lane as their way on to their land and maintain that they need (and have a right to) a 7.5m access point capable of taking large low loader type vehicles.
In the developer's design, the access would be along the residential roads of the estate, complete with speed bumps! Now it may be all too common in Ashbourne town centre, but having a 35 tonne tracked excavator on a low loader manoeuvring outside your front door seems less than ideal.
Bamford Property Limited also maintain that the plans in their current form have failed to take account of the traffic demands of the complete airfield site, once fully developed with commercial premises and housing. They call into question the capacity of the existing multi-million new road (built but not opened), especially the new roundabout and any access road from the new Harrison Way.
There do appear to be many problems with the current planning application that is due to be presented at the District Council Planning Committee on 11th April and it is recommended for refusal.
It does seem that the lack of any detailed plan for the whole of the airfield site lies at the heart of the issues we are now facing.
The size of the proposed housing allocation for this site in the Local Plan means that failure to get it back on track will have significant implications for the housing supply for the whole of the Derbyshire Dales.
This is just too big to get wrong!
*Yes I do need to get out more….