Issue - meetings

UTT/19/2692/OP - Land at Old Mead Road, Henham

Meeting: 30/09/2020 - Planning Committee (Item 4)

4 UTT/19/2692/OP - Land at Old Mead Road, Henham pdf icon PDF 492 KB

To consider application UTT/19/2692/OP.

Minutes:

The Senior Planning Officer said that this application had been to a previous Planning Committee and had been deferred for further consideration of infrastructure provision. He said the outline application was for the erection of up to six dwellings with all matters reserved except access and scale with associated works. Indicative drawings had been submitted that showed how up to six dwellings with detached garages, hard standings and a shared service road from Old Mead Road could be accommodated and the type of dwellings envisaged. A wildflower meadow was shown on the drawings, although it did not form part of the application site.

 

The Senior Planning Officer said that the issue of affordable housing had been considered as there were potentially two sites in the same ownership with a total number of up to fifteen properties to be erected thereon, although the two sites were divided by a dwelling in the middle in third party ownership, and thereby were not contiguous. He said there had been communications with the applicant about provision of a footpath to Elsenham Station but that the applicant had rejected this.

 

He said that it was considered inappropriate to require the applicant to provide on-site affordable housing at the application site in the light of the comments of the Council’s Housing Enabling Officer regarding the willingness of a housing provider to take on and subsequently find an occupier for a single unit, or in the alternative to require an off-site S106 commuted sum contribution:  and that it would be unreasonable and inappropriate for the Council to ask the applicant to provide a footpath link from the site to the train station given the extent of development in the area permitted without the imposition of such a requirement.

 

The application was recommended for approval with conditions.

 

Members discussed the issues of whether the applicant should be required to provide affordable housing or a commuted sum in lieu thereof, and the possibility of having a footpath link to the station. Most Members were strongly in support of the necessity of building a footpath but some questioned whether it was fair for only one applicant to fund this, given that this requirement had not previously been laid down against other nearby development schemes. The idea of having a footpath fund was put forward on the basis that it had to be set at such a financial level as to incentivise fundraising activity to ensure that a footpath could be built.

 

Members put forward the view that the applicant ought to be making a contribution to affordable housing, on the basis of there being an aggregate of fifteen properties in the scheme as opposed to nine. They also asked if provision and maintenance of the wildflower meadow could be considered as a condition.

 

Councillor Pavitt proposed approval of the application subject to conditions and an agreement under S106 requiring:

a) a commuted sum for one affordable home;

b) a footpath fund to be set up and a contribution thereto to  ...  view the full minutes text for item 4