Council wins planning skirmish over housing site near Milton Keynes music venue

In advance of the main battle, Milton Keynes Council and Abbey Development have locked horns at the Government’s Planning Inspectorate.

A planning inspector was called in to decide after Abbey Development appealed following a Milton Keynes Council decision not to grant “consent, agreement, or approval” to various aspects of their plan for up to 134 new homes in Wavendon Gate.

In 2017 the developers were given permission to develop the site, off Ortensia Drive, near The Stables music venue. It includes a shop.

But they have to abide by a list of conditions, a process that usually happens behind the scenes.

Last year council planners used their delegated power to refuse some of the details of the site’s ground and floor levels, and boundaries, and the developer took its case to the inspectors.

Council planners said they were concerned about reductions in ground levels close to a poplar tree, and road connections to the Groveway development to the north.

Planning inspector Anne Denby, who visited the site on February 4, said that plans to create a pond close to the tree had not proved that the it was far enough away to protect the roots.

She said that the poplar is an “important biodiversity feature for the site”, even though it would be a “monolith” with all its branches cut right back to the trunk.

“There is little detail as to whether these ground works would affect the length of time the monolith would be expected to remain upright, and therefore its value and contribution as a biodiversity feature,” she said in her decision issued on March 24.

She added that the scheme provided no certainty that the site and an adjoining one would be connected.

She said the developer’s proposals would “result in development that would be at odds” with the council’s policy to “ensure that development proposals as a whole respond appropriately to the site and surrounding context, creating places that are permeable and well connected.”

A separate planning appeal hearing is due to be held to decide whether the council was right to impose a deed of easement on the site.

It would require the developers to inform future tenants about noise from The Stables.

The developers say the council did not have the power to do that, and councillors have been called upon to support their officers in defending the decision of the development control committee.