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Councillor Scott-Boutell (in respect of her acquaintance with the objector to the application) declared a non-pecuniary interest pursuant to the provisions of Meetings General Procedure Rule 7(5).
The Committee considered an application for approval of reserved matters following outline approval 121040 and 121041 for the developments of plots NR4, SR4 and SR5 of the second phase of the Lakelands development at Church Lane, Stanway, Colchester. The application had been referred to the Committee because it was a major application and objections had been received. The Committee had before it a report and an amendment sheet in which all the information was set out.
Sue Jackson, Principal Planning Officer, presented the report and, assisted the Committee in its deliberations.
Carole Sutton, on behalf of Stanway Parish Council, addressed the Committee pursuant to the provisions of Planning Committee Procedure Rule 8 in opposition to the applications. She considered that the proposals failed to meet the national guidelines for developments to function well, be attractive and comfortable places to live. The applications included three storey units on a small footprint. The buildings had been referred to as landmarks but she considered them to be out of character and not in accordance with the vision for Stanway. The road networks proposed were of the minimum width possible and would lead to parking problems, making an existing problem worse due to the perpetuation of on-street parking by local residents. She requested this issue should be factored into the determination of the application and for the road widths to be greater in order to accommodate both parked cars and access for refuse vehicles. The Parish Council were of the view that the development needed to be of a lower density and the road network needed to be wider. She was concerned that the developer had acknowledged that it would not be financially viable to deliver a lower density scheme.
Andy Black addressed the Committee pursuant to the provisions of Planning Committee Procedure Rule 8 in support of the applications. He explained that the application had followed several months of dialogue with planning officers. He was aware of concerns about the previous phases of development at Lakelands and this application was seeking to return to the concept contained within the original masterplan for the area. As such taller houses were proposed at key points in the development. He acknowledged the concerns about parking but the provision proposed accorded with the standards adopted by the Council. In terms of the references to the development not being in keeping with the surrounding area, he reaffirmed the intention that the proposals were in response to the principles contained in the original master plan.
Some members of the Committee sympathised with the concerns regarding density and the overpowering nature of the design, acknowledging that the first phase at Lakelands had been very low which gave an impression of units in the current proposal being very tightly packed in comparison. Clarification was sought about the location of the landmark buildings, one member stating a preference for these to be away from the entrance to the development. Reference was also made to the Parish Plan which had recommended dwellings no higher than three storey and the future maintenance of open spaces and to neighbourhood tensions which had come to light following the building of the first phase of the Lakelands development and the need to ensure that parking provision and space allocation was agreed before housing was occupied.
The Principal Planning Officer confirmed that the road network was already established and in place and that the master plan had provided for both three and four storey elements to the development, although this was not necessarily in accordance with the Stanway Vision. She confirmed that the Urban Designer was satisfied with the layout and design of the buildings and that the Highway Authority had raised no objection to the proposed road network.
Concerns were shared by a number of members regarding problems of excessive surface water, the risk of flooding and the measures being adopted to mitigate these issues. The previous use of the site for the extraction of sand and gravel was mentioned in the light of the number of dwellings planned to be built, whether the drainage proposals, which had been agreed some years ago for the first phase of the development, involved a reliance on artificial pumping and whether they needed to be reviewed in the light of changes in environmental circumstances.
The Planning Projects Specialist explained the hierarchy in terms of the Committee’s consideration of the contents of the Village Design Statement, the forthcoming Neighbourhood Plan and the approved master plan. He stated that the application site was located at a higher level than existing dwellings, gave details of the water drainage arrangements, confirmed that the drainage proposals had been formulated based on the number of dwellings envisaged for the development as a whole and suggested the initiation of discussions with Essex County Council and Anglian Water to review the drainage arrangements for the site as a whole.
RESOLVED (SIX voted FOR, FOUR voted AGAINST and TWO ABSTAINED) that –
(i) The planning application be approved subject to the conditions set out in the report
(ii) The Head of Commercial Services make arrangements to facilitate discussions with Essex County Council, Anglian Water and, where appropriate, the developers to review the effectiveness of drainage arrangements at Lakelands and to report back to the Committee in due course.