An outline planning application has been submitted to Mendip District Council for the development of 107 new houses in a field on Cuckoo Hill, between Packsaddle Way, Innox Hill and Spring Gardens, and close to the River Frome downstream of the town.

The submitted plans, reports and consultation comments, can all be found on Mendip District Council’s webpages here (planning application 2013/2608/OTS). These include an illustrative masterplan, which shows how 107 homes (a range of 2, 3 and 4 bedrooms) could be arranged on site. Reports have been submitted on Design and Access, Ecology, Flood Risks, Transport and Air Quality.

I understand residents living around the site, in Packsaddle Way, Innox Hill, Cuckoo Hill and Spring Gardens, are scrutinising the plans and are likely to object, on a number of grounds. I am helping local residents understand the process and the impacts of the proposals, and to make suitable responses to the Council’s consultation. Some 120 people have commented, all objecting, as of Weds 19th March.

There has been no pre-application consultation with the local community. The site is not allocated for development in Mendip’s adopted Local Plan or draft Local Plan, and is outside the settlement limit, so is open countryside. The Local Plan has been submitted for Examination, which will be heard in April, so that should be afforded considerable weight when this planning application is determined. No ‘affordable housing’ is proposed on site, contrary to adopted and draft Mendip Local Plan policy – the applicants’ Affordable Housing Statement attempts to justify this by pleading that there is ‘no value’ in the site and the developer would not make enough profit to provide it (predicting a profit of only £2.8 million (12% on gross development value) with 30% affordable housing required, instead of £4.1m (17%) without any). No areas of public open space or playground are proposed. No assessment has been carried out of the landscape and visual impacts of the development.  The submitted Mendip Local Plan’s Sustainability Appraisal, at Appendix 12, identifies the site within ‘Landscapes at the edge of town: Good quality land which is prominent and important to the setting of the town’, and ‘steeply sloping land’.  The steeply sloping nature of the site means that it is highly visible from countryside to the north, west and east, and from residences to the south, as existing hedgerows do not screen the site. No structural landscape planting is proposed.  The development would lead to be coalescence of the urban area of Frome with the village of Spring Gardens.  No archaeology surveys have been carried out. Residents have identified the site as being used as a foraging ground for Barn Owls, which receive special protection from disturbance under Schedule 1 of the Wildlife and Countryside Act 1981, which has not been picked up in the submitted Preliminary Ecological Assessment Report. Substantial concerns have been raised by residents in Spring Gardens on the likely increase in flooding downhill at Spring Gardens in Flood Zones 2 and 3 around the confluence of the rivers Frome and Mells, and that the Flood Risk Assessment does not assess this in detail.  An independent review of the FRA report identified that the proposed measures to retain water on site to avoid flooding downhill (an enormous tank, and water butts in gardens) are not likely to be acceptable to the Environment Agency, so will need to be reassessed.  Substantial concerns have been raised by the residents of Packsaddle Way and adjacent roads about the likely increase in traffic using these roads. The development would make Packsaddle Way an even larger cul-de-sac, contrary to Somerset County Council’s Estate Roads Design Guidance which states the size of ‘collector roads’ should be up to 200 houses.

I have already asked the agents for the developer to withdraw the plans, consult local residents, and consider the Local Plan process instead of this premature planning application – I await to hear back.

This is the fifth planning application to develop the field for housing, with the four previous proposals all being refused, in 1975, 1976/77, 1981/82 and 1987.  The 1987 appeal refusal decision includes a good summary of previous arguments, states that “… one element of consistency has been the continued refusal of planning permission for residential development of the site”, and tells that objections and reasons for refusal have included: the erosion of countryside, effects on the landscape of a sizeable intrusion of development into open countryside which would damage and erode its attractive rural character and have a serious visual impact, with Council policies affording protection of the countryside; risks of smell and loss of amenity due to the ‘undesirably close’ Frome sewage treatment works, with Council policy identifying a ‘cordon sanitaire’ which covers the site; highway safety and convenience, including that it is ‘not satisfactory’ to extend the already long Packsaddle Way estate cul-de-sac collector road further (and that previous plans to add a second road access off Innox Hill were rejected as Lower Innox, Innox Hill and Spring Gardens are not suitable to accommodate a substantial increase in traffic, and due to concerns of the environmental effects of turning Packsaddle Way into a local distributor road); the development has been regarded as premature and sufficient housing land was available and allocated elsewhere in Mendip’s previous local plans; and the plans would cause demonstrable harm to interests of acknowledged importance, including erosion of countryside and exposure to smell; children playing at the Packsaddle open space playground on the corner of Pedlars Grove may be exposed to added danger from additional traffic; the arguments of the applicants were not sufficiently special to justify a departure from the Council’s policies protecting the countryside.

Please see the local campaign group Save Cuckoo Hill website here, which explains how to respond to the planning application on Mendip District Council’s website.

The Frome Standard have an article all about this – see here.

The deadline for the official public consultation period is Weds 19 March, 3 weeks after site notices went up on 26th February.

I will update this page when more info is available.

Update 2 July 2014: The proposals to develop 107 new homes at the end of Packsaddle Way in open countryside have been withdrawn. The proposals (ref 2013/2608) met with over 130 objections from residents, including mine, as well as the Environment Agency, Frome Town Council and Mendip’s housing development officer, after a spirited campaign by local residents.  The developer amended the flood risk assessment, commissioned a report to assess the landscape and visual impacts, and revised the masterplan to fit in a drainage attenuation pond. Mendip planners sought a second opinion on the viability of development, as the developer tried to justify not providing any ‘affordable housing’ here. Earlier this year I asked the developers to withdraw their plans, and they now have done.  I understand they might try to have the site allocated for development in Part 2 of Mendip’s Local Plan, but we shall have to wait and see.