Gladman set for Carlisle refusal

The Cheshire developer’s plans for 90 houses on the edge of Scotby are set to be refused by the city council’s planning committee on three grounds.

Gladman’s outline plans for the 13.4-acre site have met with stiff resistance locally, with close to 200 letters of objection being filed, along with a petition. Carlisle City Council’s planning officers have provided three reasons for refusing the scheme: scale and design, housing need, and the site being contrary to the landscaping part of the Local Plan.

The site lies on the eastern edge of Scotby and is agricultural, with housing intended for the northern part of the site, towards the Scotby-Wetheral Road and the recently developed Alders Edge housing. In all, around 6.7 acres of the site are to be built on.

In its design & access statement prepared with FPCR Environment & Design, Gladman said that the development will provide for a broad mix of homes from first-time buyers to family housing. Notification of the application, which was filed in November 2018, was sent to 54 addresses, along with a site notice and press notice, leading to the submission of 195 letters of objection and a petition, with most complainants citing over-development for a rural area. A further objection has come from Friends of the Lake District, although Natural England has raised no objection.

In the view of Carlisle’s officers, there are three grounds for refusal. On scale and design, officers state that the proposal is contrary to the Windfall Housing Development of the Carlisle District Local Plan, being “imappropriate to the scale and character to the character of Scotby”.

On need, officers state that the applicant has failed to demonstrate an overriding need for additional housing in the location; while the third point relates to the Local Plan – the site had been considered for housing allocation against others from the inception of the Local Plan, but was specifically excluded due to the impact on landscape.