Warehouse plans in village near Milton Keynes set for approval
Plans to build nine warehouses and a new country park on agricultural land near a Milton Keynes village are set to get the green light from the council, despite receiving almost 3,500 objections from the public.
The 40-hectare site is located above the A5 by Old Stratford, stretching across four large fields. The former Furtho Pit gravel works, which have since been infilled and restored to agricultural land, also form part of the site.
The application, submitted by Frontier Estates, will go before West Northamptonshire Council’s (WNC) strategic planning committee on Tuesday, June 30. Planning officers have recommended approval for the large employment site, which the developer said would be known as Frontier Park.
Once operational, the development is expected to support approximately 955 on-site jobs for the local area and will consist of almost 70,000 square metres of floor space. According to planning papers, the largest building would be 36,287sqm and a height of 18.9 metres, with the other eight units on the business park being smaller by design.
WNC has said that the plans received 3,453 objections from members of the public, as well as concerns raised by 11 nearby parish councils, the Northamptonshire Wildlife Trust, WNC ecology and more.
Many concerns were raised around the impact on traffic and existing roads, flooding in downstream areas, pollution linked to the site, the loss of green space and damage to habitats and questions on whether such a development is necessary in a rural area.
Ward councillor for the area, Ian McCord, has objected to the plan, saying: “This proposed development is too close to the village and will cause serious issues with the increase of traffic for HGVs and also vehicles for workers.
“There must be more appropriate areas for this to be built on, not the entrance to a historic village on the edge of Milton Keynes.”
Another local resident said: “There are serious concerns regarding flood risk, harm to wildlife habitats, and the visual impact on the local countryside which so many people use and love.
“I urge the council to reject this application and not just do it for financial gain, as I can’t see any other reasoning for it.”
A local campaign group, known as ‘Stop 3,000 Trucks’, was also launched to bring members of the community together to lobby against the warehousing plans and encourage residents to submit objections and write to local representatives.
Frontier Estates say the development site is “an opportunity to deliver a well-considered and sensitively designed new industrial/ logistics park with the associated jobs this will bring, across a variety of employment opportunities”.
They added: “Acknowledging the sensitive nature of this site, the architecture has been carefully considered so as to respond to the surrounding context and local vernacular. Rather than the standard ‘could have been built anywhere’ big-box architecture, this is a scheme grounded in Northants.”
Weighing up the proposal, WNC planning officers have said that the proposal would deliver a number of significant benefits, including the provision of a publicly accessible country park, biodiversity net gain, and substantial economic benefits through job creation.
“Taking these benefits into account, and having regard to the development plan as a whole, it is considered that the identified harm does not significantly and demonstrably outweigh the benefits of the proposal,” they concluded.
The strategic planning meeting will take place at the Towcester Forum at 1pm on Tuesday, June 30. It will be up to the elected councillors on the panel whether to side with officers’ advice and approve the site or to draw their own conclusions on the proposals and reject them.
