South Ribble eco-home plan derailed by length of driveway

South Ribble Borough Council’s planning committee blocked the construction of the six-bedroomed dwelling off Potter Lane, which members were told would have housed four generations of the same family.

The plans featured a subterranean cinema and open-plan games room, along with a ground floor infinity pool. Secure parking would also have formed part of the basement level.

The scheme sought to minimise energy bills and reduce the impact on the environment by incorporating solar technology and ground/air source heat pumps.

However, the greenbelt location of the proposed development meant that one of the few ways in which it could be deemed acceptable was if it were shown to be a so-called “infill” plot, plugging a gap between existing properties.

The application site is located in the grounds of an existing dwelling, “The Oaks”, and members were advised that the new home would “provide for four detached dwellings in close proximity to each other”.

However, planning officer Catherine Lewis said that the proposed access point for the dwelling stretched the definition of what should count as infilling.

“The other properties are accessed from a spur of Potter Lane, but to enable this property to form part of that cluster...there would be a need to construct [a 60-metre] driveway across [an] open aspect of [the] land - and that would have an impact on the openness of the site.

“[There] isn’t a true gap in [the] frontage [of the houses] - it requires that access point,” Ms. Lewis said.

Louise Green, the daughter of the applicants - who lives in The Oaks and spoke on behalf of her parents - noted that the authority’s two most recent decisions to refuse infill applications had been overturned on appeal.

“South Ribble have not adopted a policy of their own to define what would be acceptable to them as infill. Therefore, on both of those appeals the council’s position that there needed to be a developed frontage was found to be incorrect,” Ms. Green said.

Committee member Cllr Barrie Yates told colleagues that the historical importance of the site should also be taken into account as well as planning legislation.

“In the 10th century there was a fort nearby...that historians are still looking at [and] that needs to be preserved.

“In 1645, Cromwell came through and had a battle in that area. Just across from the river there is a vast graveyard of the fallen soldiers of the roundheads and the cavaliers,” Cllr Yates said.

Cllr James Flannery said that there were “positives” to the eco-home proposal, but councillors ultimately agreed with planning officers and unanimously rejected the scheme.