Southwell Town Council objects to 45-house development at The Vineries, off Lower Kirklington Road

A council stood by its objections to a 45-house development on former agricultural and allotment land – as privacy concerns persist.

Southwell Town Council’s planning committee discussed the application - for land to the rear of The Vineries, on Lower Kirklington Road - at its meeting on Wednesday (March 6).

The application, by Cameron Homes Ltd, Sir John Starkey, Keith Maxey, Katherine Maxey, John Judson, Ann Judson, and Richard Mullard, plans for a mixture of detached, semi detached and terraced properties and bungalows, with associated green spaces and children’s play area.

Councillors agreed to maintain their objections, although accepted the reserved matters application is now valid after modifications have been made to the plans.

They had previously challenged the validity as the outline application, approved in 2021, allowed the access for up to 45 dwellings, but initial reserved matters plans saw the five existing properties at The Vineries also connected to the access, meaning it would serve up to 50 homes.

This connection was removed in a revised drawing submitted in January.

The committee unanimously agreed to continue their objection made in December 2023, due to inconsistency in plans, design layout, ecology issues, flood risk and highways issues.

A number of neighbours to the application site attended the meeting to comment on the application.

Tim Wendels’ home on Avondale Lane sits next to one of the five-bedroom homes planned for the site. In the outline application the house was smaller and sat 27m from the rear of his property, but is now planned to be larger and 12m from his home.

He described the wall which would face his garden as a “monster wall” which would “overshadow” the house and block light from his garden and ground floor rooms, and raised concerns about the validity of the applicant’s submitted shadow study.

He said: “Remarkably it shows the property won’t cast any significant shadows.

“The shadow study has zero credibility.”

Mr Wendels explained that he had looked at the shadows his own home cast, which he expected to be similar to those of the new home, and they ranged from 12m to 17m — enough for the new property to entirely cover his garden and patio space in shadow.

Residents of Private Drive, which borders the site’s eastern boundary, also spoke at the meeting.

They dispute the inclusion of the historic hedgerow bordering their road in the Vineries plans, and raised additional concerns that the development wasn’t doing enough to protect it or ensure privacy for them.

They explained that, unlike other hedges on the development site, gardens backing onto the boundary with Private Drive were not planned to have fencing to act as a buffer between the property and the hedge, and they believe the hedge should be better protected.

Additionally, the hedge has suffered damage which residents are working to restore, but they say it is not a suitably private or secure boundary between homes.

One resident raised safety concerns based on this, and added: “Where they’re looking to put the park, you can step right through to our driveway.”

Further concerns were raised about the positioning of two storey homes alongside Private Drive and how they would overlook the existing homes, and a question raised as to if the bungalows elsewhere in the development could be moved to be alongside the neighbouring properties.

Another resident said: “We don’t object to the development overall, but we do object to the lack of consideration and privacy.”

Roger Blaney noted there was still an outstanding Highways Authority objection on the planning portal, which is due to a missing turning facility for delivery vehicles, insufficient and improper bin collection points, a lack of vehicular visibility splays on plot 38, and incorrectly sized pedestrian visibility splays.

It also requested traffic calming measures for the main road.

Mr Blaney added: “We’ve yet to see a response from Newark and Sherwood District Council’s tree officer, or their newly appointed ecology officer.

“These reports are clearly important.”

The application includes the removal of a number of trees and hedgerows on the site.

Gina Adams also commented on the newest arboricultural assessment, which planned for two more trees to be removed than the previous plans did.

“That is not the right direction for this to be going,” she added.

She also called to attention the planned four and five bedroom houses, which have also faced opposition from Southwell Civic Society, as the town’s draft Neighbourhood Plan calls for no further houses of that size.

“It is wrong of them to have tried to slip those in since the outline planning application,” she added.

The Highways Authority objection also noted the inclusion of three-bed houses with upstairs studies in plans and said it “should be counted as a four-bed house”.

Steve Perry suggested the labelling of house sizes in this way was ‘dodgy’.

He also raised concerns about the amount of concrete and hard surfaces included in the application despite the flood risks, and added: “We should really be saying where’s your solar panels, where’s your water harvesting.

“I’m quite strongly against this at the moment.”

Malcolm Brock said the new plans were an “improvement” but said he was still not content with the proposals.

He said: “I take Tim [Wendels]’s point about the ‘great wall of Southwell’. Maybe it will be a tourist attraction.”

Gina Adams raised further concerns about the impact the increased number of beds — and therefore residents — now planned for the site on services in the town.

As the number of new dwellings hadn’t changed since the outline application the NHS maintained its first request for a contribution of £44,190 — and in this request, made at the time of the outline application, it noted “all practices in the area are working at capacity” and the plan to provide care would likely be “reconfiguration or extension of existing premises or a new build that this S106 contribution will contribute towards”.

Roger Blaney said: “One of the frustrating things about schemes of this size is the silence of the NHS.”

He added that the “lived experience” of people in Southwell showed it was already difficult to get a GP appointment at Southwell Medical Centre — as it is the only surgery in the town and also serves a number of nearby villages.

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