Butter our butts and call us a scone – as they say in the West Country – but ‘Your Waverley’ is changing the habit of a lifetime and has begun turning down housing development in the countryside!
Ewhurst is the first village to benefit from having a ‘sound and approved Local Plan’ and so thick were the praises being heaped on planning officers for achieving this miracle that you could double up on a huge dollop of West Country clotted cream!
The borough of Waverley has not had the protection of a Local Development Plan since 2002! And, until recently has consistently objected to two of the largest brownfield sites in the borough being developed! Dunsfold Aerodrome and Hewitts Industrial Estate in Cranleigh!
‘Such a wonderful report,’ ‘the officers are marvellous,’ ‘they have worked soooooo hard.’ Pass the sick bowl – Alice! All because planning officers have done a complete volte-face just months after recommending approval of a development at Firethorn Farm, Ewhurst of 58 dwellings on a field under WA/2017/0369, behind Larkfields in Horsham Lane, Ewhurst, and on the same day it recommended approval again, in a 79 PAGE REPORT FOR A REDUCED NUMBER OF 49 DWELLINGS BECAUSE – its benefits would outweigh the harm. Then on the night it then recommending refusal, in a one-page report, because its harm would outweigh the benefits!
CONFUSED?
NOW YOU SEE IT ON THE AGENDA FEBRUARY 2018
NOW YOU DONT ON A SUPPLEMENTARY REPORT FEBRUARY 2018
But Ewhurst residents may not be able to hold their breath for too long. The applicant landowner Mr Peter Nutting has also registered a planning appeal.
Councillor Stephen Mulliner, a member of the JPC, suggested the applicant should be talking to the Parish Council which is in the process of producing its own Neighbourhood Plan. “I don’t rule this site out forever, the applicant should be seeking discussions with the parish council for its inclusion in the Neighbourhood Plan.
Former Portfolio Holder for Planning Councillor Brian Adams said: ‘This site has never been compared with other sites in the area. He now believed, ‘as the site was, now on the radar, it could come before us again in the Local Plan Part 11 in 12 months time!’
