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STOP WEST WINCANTON

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The most important report that will be required for this planning application will be a Landscape and Visual Impact Assessment or LVIA.

This report will attempt to show that building all over the green fields of a hillside farm will have minimal effect on the appearance of Wincanton or the people who live here or nearby settlements.
The Planning Department will engage the services of Landscape Architects to revue and comment on the LVIA report.
 

In 2019 a Land Proposer called Gladman submitted a Planning Application (19/01953/OUT) to build 210 houses on part of Hook Valley Farm.



 

 

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PREVIOUS PLANNING APPLICATION AREA OUTLINED IN YELLOW

WINCANTON NEIGHBOURHOOD PLAN

Policy 1.

Visually sensitive areas (identified in the Proposals Map) are locations where new buildings would cause substantial harm to local character and setting of the town. This includes:
 

  •  the higher ground west of New Barns Farm where development would be visually prominent on the skyline,

 

  • Lawrence Hill

 

  • the higher ground to the north of the town


Proposals for new buildings within these visually sensitive areas are not supported, unless necessary to support the rural economy.

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LANDSCAPE ARCHITECT'S COMMENTS
 

  • The site (i.e. higher ground to the west of New Barns Farm’) is also specifically identified in the Neighbourhood Plan as a visually sensitive area ‘where development would cause substantial harm to local character and the setting of the town’.The proposed development would therefore cause considerable harm to landscape that is recognised as important to the setting and character of Wincanton.

 

  • The development would also result in permanent significant effects on the visual amenity of those groups of people who live or use the local road and footpath network within and around the edges of the site.

 

  • The proposed development conflicts with a variety of planning policies and, in our opinion, is inappropriate in terms of the level of potential adverse impacts it will have on the landscape and visual environment and the setting of Wincanton.

 

WINCANTON TOWN COUNCIL REPRESENTATIVE


The Committee were then addressed by a representative of Wincanton Town Council.  He said the Council wished to protect that site as an area of natural beauty as it enhanced the town’s rural location.  The additional traffic which the development would generate was a concern and the site was not within walking distance of the town centre which would mean increased demand on the limited parking.  The Town Council had adopted an Environment and Ecological Plan to nurture the historical and natural beauty of the town and the proposed development was at odds with this.  Health, education and local employment could not serve the development and the Town Council strongly objected to it.

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PLANNING OFFICER COMMENTS


REFUSE PERMISSION FOR THE FOLLOWING REASON:

 01. The site is outside the settlement of Wincanton, in a prominent location on rising land and in an identified visually sensitive area. The site is not allocated for development in the South Somerset Local Plan (2006-2028) or identified as an area for growth. Development of this site will have a significant and demonstrably detrimental impact upon the character of the landscape, the visual amenity of the site and locality, and upon the setting of Wincanton.  The application is therefore contrary to Policy EQ2 of the South Somerset Local Plan (2006-2028), Policy 1 of the Wincanton Neighbourhood Plan, and the National Planning Policy Framework.

(Voting: unanimous in favour of refusal)


 

 

 

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