October 2009 Newsletter

8 Affordable Homes for Tansley Derbyshire


Working as agents for the Peak District Rural Housing Association, we obtained planning permission for six houses and two flats on a greenfield exception site on the edge of Tansley in October. The permission was hard won. The proposals had been drawn up following a housing needs survey undertaken by the Parish Council in July 2008. This survey identified a need for up to 28 affordable dwellings, to meet the needs of primarily young people who wanted to remain in the village. Using a standard discount value, the immediate need was identified for 9 homes.

The Head of Development Control visited the village back in February and reviewed all the possible alternative sites before agreeing with the Parish Council that the West Yard site was the best. In this case the landowner is also the builder, making the scheme viable as very little money is paid to the landowner for a 100% affordable housing scheme.

The application attracted substantial level of objection from an active minority in the village. It was a classic NIMBY action where concern was expressed that it was an affordable only scheme that would attract the ‘wrong sort’ of people to the village notwithstanding that the houses would only be let to people from the village.

In the face of this opposition the Parish Council changed its position and raised an objection to the development. The objectors raised wildlife and flooding issues requiring the provision of extra reports, at significant cost to he applicant. The application went to committee in September and was deferred to allow the objectors to identify an alternative site. At the beginning of October the planning committee meeting was abandoned due to a very unfortunate incident when an objector to another planning application had a major heart attack in the meeting.

On the 22nd October 7 weeks after the original meeting and with the objectors having failed to identify an alternative site, permission was granted in the teeth of vocal and at times unseemly opposition. Strong support was given to the proposals by planning officers and spoken local support from the village at the meeting helped sway Councillors.

It was a night that I felt particularly proud that we had achieved a good result and we would be pleased to take forward other affordable housing schemes with Registered Social Landlords.