Proposed erection of two detached dwellings and new vehicular access.

The application was approved contrary to the Case Officer’s recommendation.

(Proposed erection of two detached dwellings and new vehicular access.)

(Councillors Greenow, Norman and Summers had left the meeting and were not present during consideration of this application.)

The Senior Planning Officer gave a presentation on the application, and updates/additional representations received following the publication of the agenda were provided in the update sheet, as appended to these minutes.

In accordance with the criteria for public speaking, Mrs J Joseph, the applicant’s agent, spoke in support of the application.

The local ward member, Councillor DG Harlow was unable to attend the meeting.  The Chairperson read out a statement he had submitted.

The statement contained the following principal comments:

In principle he was in favour of the application for the following reasons:

·        Broad Oak is a settlement in the Core strategy within the larger parish of Garway. As well as having a popular and successful school the parish also has a new village hall and in Broad Oak itself there is a petrol station and village shop. This means that in the context of rural Herefordshire this location is a highly sustainable option for a small scale development.

·        A bus service operates from Broad Oak to Hereford

·        A reduced speed limit onto the B4521 making it a 30mph zone had made the road much slower addressing any concerns over road safety.  No objection had been made by the Transportation Manager.

·        There is no single style of home in Broad Oak and the variety offered by this new scheme would complement rather than detract from the visual style.

·        Building on pockets like this one on the edge of a sustainable village helped to ensure rural housebuilding and contribute to meeting the housing land supply targets.

·        There had been considerable interest from local families wanting to move to the houses thereby ensuring continuity amongst rural families

In summary, whilst he understood that some existing residents may oppose development in the area more rural housing was needed, particularly this sort of development in this sort of location. 

In the Committee’s discussion of the application the following principal points were made:

The local ward member supported the application.  The proposal was for 2 houses in a settlement where development was permitted in accordance with policy RA2.

The principle of development did not appear to be at issue.  The site was sustainable.  The question was one of scale and design.

Reference was made to the decision taken on application 184506 earlier in the meeting and the importance of consistency in decision making. It was suggested that it appeared that officers were prepared to recommend approval of a large scheme in an area outside the settlement boundary, giving weight to the social and economic benefits, but were not inclined to attribute such weight in the case of a small scheme.

The Lead Development Manager commented that policy RA2 provided that, in the absence of an NDP, applications would be assessed on whether they were within or adjacent to the built up area.  The majority of NDP’s would require development to be within the settlement boundary.  An application adjacent to the settlement boundary would not be looked on favourably, subject to every application having to be considered on its own merits.  He considered the application did differ to application 180456 in that in this case there was an NDP with limited weight.  It was a question of whether the site was locationally acceptable for development, whether the development would result in a change of character, and whether the design was considered acceptable within that location. 

Councillor Baker proposed and Councillor Johnson seconded a motion that the application be approved on the grounds that the proposal was compliant with policy RA2.  The motion was carried with 6 votes in favour, 3 against and 2 abstentions.

RESOLVED:  That planning permission be granted on the grounds that the proposal was compliant with policy RA2 and officers named in the scheme of delegation to officers be authorised to detail the conditions and reasons put forward for approval.