Plan for Yorkshire village houses blocked to avoid ‘undesirable precedent’
The building of two houses in a North Yorkshire village has been blocked to avoid setting ‘an undesirable precedent’.
Oliver Stead’s plan to build up to two dwellings in the village of Snainton near Scarborough has been rejected over concerns about the impact on the local conservation area.
The proposed site, a grass field in West Lane, Snainton, is an “attractive historic part of the village characterised by traditional stone cottages and breaks between development in the form of paddocks and agricultural fields”.
Officers at North Yorkshire Council said that any development would detract from the appearance of the landscape and human activity would erode the tranquillity of the site.
“The proposal would therefore result in significant harm to the character and appearance of the area,” they said.
The applicant suggested that creating up to two dwellings would be a “positive and valuable boost in the housing stock, especially given the significant shortfall that has been identified by the council”.
Planners added that “inappropriate development in this location would result in a significant harm to the visual amenity of the conservation area”.
According to a council report, the development of the site would also cause substantial harm to the character of the conservation area.
“Plots such as this are present in many outlying areas beyond the development limits of existing settlements, and an approval of this application could set an undesirable precedent which would make other, similar applications harder to resist,” the report states.
No objections were made by the Highway Authority, which said that the principle of residential use in the proposed location was “not inherently unacceptable on highway grounds”.
However, the council’s conservation officer noted that as no heritage statement or impact assessment had been submitted, the plan would fail to preserve or enhance the special character or appearance of the conservation area.
One local resident objected to the plan citing concerns about “very poor access, as West Lane is a small, narrow, single-lane road with no through access that leads to a livery stable, working farms and the hound kennels”.
They added: “It is simply not designed to accommodate ongoing development. Secondly, great consideration should be given to the impact traffic will have on horses who are daily walked up and down West Lane to the surrounding fields.”
The scheme was refused by the council.