Issue - meetings

Demolition of all buildings on the site including residential dwelling and construction of a light industrial (Use Class E(g)(iii)) building with biomass boiler, associated car parking, landscaping and alterations to land levels at South Bend, Station Road, Kings Langley.

Recommendation: Defer to the Head of Regulatory Services and subject to the recommendation of no objection from the Lead Local Flood Authority (LLFA) and Environmental Health Officer (EHO), the inclusion of any conditions recommended by the LLFA and EHO, and following referral to the Secretary of State and subject to them raising no objection, and following completion of a S106 Agreement (securing a monitoring fee in relation to BNG) that Planning Permission is granted.

Councillor Drury left the room for this item.

The application was for demolition of all buildings on site including residential dwelling and construction of a light industrial (Use Class E(g)(iii)) building with biomass boiler, associated car parking, landscaping and alterations to land levels at South Bend, Station Road, Kings Langley.

The application was before the committee as it had been called in by three members of the Planning Committee regardless of officer recommendation due to loss of the residential unit and land and the introduction of a business use in the Metropolitan Green Belt.

The Planning Officer provided an update on the Green Belt assessment in relation to the application following the publication of the revised NPPF earlier in the day and also provided other updates as set out below:

‘The Officers’ report to committee sets out that proposed development is inappropriate in the Green Belt by definition and that there is some limited harm through failure to comply with criteria (c) which relates to safeguarding the countryside from encroachment.  However, the report identifies that there are Very Special Circumstances which collectively combine to constitute material considerations of sufficient weight to amount to ‘very special circumstances’ that clearly outweigh the identified harm to Green Belt and the identified harm caused by loss of a residential dwelling to enable planning permission to be granted subject to conditions.

As noted at the start of the meeting, a revised NPPF was published today.  The revised NPPF includes changes in relation to development within Green Belt including the introduction of a new classification of land, ‘Grey Belt’.

The NPPF defines Grey Belt as:

For the purposes of plan-making and decision-making, ‘grey belt’ is defined as land in the Green Belt comprising previously developed land and/or any other land that, in either case, does not strongly contribute to any of purposes (a), (b), or (d) in paragraph 143. ‘

Purposes (a), (b) and (d) are:

a) to check the unrestricted sprawl of large built-up areas;

b) to prevent neighbouring towns merging into one another;

d) to preserve the setting and special character of historic towns.

As set out at paragraph 8.2.5 of the committee report, in this case some of the site would constitute previously developed land due to it containing a residential dwelling, and the pre-existing car servicing and repairs business. In addition, having regard to the location and characteristics of the application site it is considered that the site does not strongly contribute to purposes a, b or d. As such officers are of the view that the site should be classified as Grey Belt.

We must then turn to paragraph 155 of the revised NPPF which advises that;

The development of homes, commercial and other development in the Green Belt should also not be regarded as inappropriate where:

a) The development would utilise grey belt land and would not fundamentally undermine the purposes (taken together) of the remaining Green Belt across the area of the plan;

b) There is a demonstrable unmet  ...  view the full minutes text for item 89