Middleton St George's plans for 198 homes are delayed

Homes By Carlton Ltd applied to change their plans to build the houses on an 8.46-hectare site on the edge of Middleton St George.

The development is expected to take another five years, with 50 homes almost finished and about 30 more to come per year.

The planning application, which alters the proposed layout and ways of getting into the site, attracted 83 objections from residents.

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The objectors raised concerns about noise, vibration, dust, air pollution, construction traffic, road safety, surface damage, dangerous parking, congestion, ecology, crime and loss of green space.

They said the development had caused "major disruption to residents" and the current infrastructure could not cope with the scheme.

The plan for 198 homes, approved in March 2018, included two accesses to the development - one via High Stell, the other via Grendon Gardens and The Greenway.

Councillors on the Darlington Borough Council planning committee refused the developer permission to build the first 50 homes using just one access point as they felt this would have an "unacceptable impact" on residents.

However on appeal, an inspector allowed the developers to use only the Grendon Gardens access, with the High Stell access not needed until the first 50 houses had been built.

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Now the developer says it cannot provide the second access point at High Stell at all "due to constraining factors" outside their control.

So it has asked the council to take out that planning condition.

This would mean the rest of the construction would go through The Greenway and Grendon Gardens.

A council report says: "In summary, the developer is now unable to provide a second access."

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Middleton St George Parish Council objected to the proposal saying: "To take all the development traffic from the entire 198 houses (all four phases), in addition to the all the construction traffic, would constitute a severe impact on residential amenity in terms of noise, dust, traffic safety hazards."

They said they regularly received complaints from residents about the development.

Countryside charity CPRE (Campaign to Protect Rural England) also objected, supporting residents' concerns and saying the proposal could worsen existing problems.

After consulting a leading QC, planning officers considered the "minor change" to be acceptable.

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Highway officers said it would be difficult to justify refusal as 50 homes had already been built with one access point.

The report says: "It is not expected that daily vehicle movements associated with construction would exceed those already experienced by residents as part of phase one.

But it goes on to say: "Additional predicted vehicle movements with Grendon Gardens will now be roughly double what was first anticipated."

It stated the accident rate on surrounding roads was "low and does not raise a cause for concern".

Officers also said "anecdotal evidence of frequent minor accidents or near misses" cited by residents could not be substantiated, but parked vehicles was a road safety concern.

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Planning officers said refusing the change would prevent the rest of the development, "leaving an unsatisfactory environment" for residents.

They recommended approval with conditions, including the developer paying £85,000 towards traffic calming and a 20mph zone at Grendon Gardens and The Greenway.

A decision was to be made by the planning committee on Wednesday (September 7).

Cllr Doris Jones. Picture: Stuart Boulton. (Image: Stuart Boulton, Newsquest)

But chair Councillor Doris Jones proposed to postpone the decision for a more up-to-date highway assessment.

She said: "The last one was 2015. As we all know there have been a lot of changes since then.

"A major concern is the traffic. I would feel more comfortable if the application was tidied up with a more up-to-date traffic count."

Councillors voted unanimously to defer the application.

"There'll be no discussion on this application today," said Cllr Jones.

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