CONTROVERSIAL plans to build a millionaire’s row and a business park on a golf course have been pulled.

Developer Banks Developments has withdrawn its application for a £75m development of the Mount Oswald Golf Course in Durham City in the face of pressure from local planners.

It wanted to build 12 homes worth at least £1m each, offices, student flats, and create parkland and wetland. It claimed the venture could provide up to 1,000 jobs.

But first Durham City Council and then its successor, Durham County Council, wanted the firm to address a "large number of technical issues’’ regarding the scheme and planners asked the company to withdrawn the scheme.

It has decided to do this and to review its options for submitting a new proposal in the future.

Mark Dowdall, its environment and community director, said: "We still believe that the development proposals we put forward for this site would have been beneficial for the region and would have brought new businesses and jobs to the area at a time of such economic difficulties.

"We have been working for several months on ways in which we might address the areas of concern that have been raised with us, but we now feel that we will not be able to do this to the degree required to get the current plans approved, so have taken the decision to withdraw them.

"Despite this withdrawal, we are still hopeful that a commercial scheme would be successful on this site, which has long been part of the local development plan, and we are now examining our options for returning with a new proposal in the future which fits more closely with the plan's requirements.’’ Opponent of the scheme Peter Jackson, a Nevilles Cross resident and Friends of the Earth member, said the scheme would cause traffic congestion on the A167.

"The basic reaction is that I’m pleased that they have seen reality - if that is what it is - but I think a lot of people would suspect that they would intend to come back at some time in the future.’’ He called for the site to be withdrawn as an officially listed potential development site.

"I think the local politicians should review the whole thing and take it out of the Local Plan. It is questionable why it as included without any public consultation.’’