Homes near Newport plan to go before committee

PSL Building Services has applied to redevelop the site, on Barrack Lane, Lilleshall, and Telford & Wrekin’s planning committee will vote on the proposal next week.

Planning officers recommend the nine-member panel approves the Telford-based company’s plans but, in a report, note that the parish council and ward councillor are against it, calling it “out of character with the location” and likely to “create visibility concerns for passing traffic”.

“The piece of land where the two detached dwellings are proposed is located to the side, currently vacant and covered in vegetation,” the planners’ report says.

“The proposed dwellings will be open market dwellings and the scheme will see an increase of three dwellings on the site.”

During two rounds of consultation, 31 comments were received from neighbouring properties.

Summarising some of the objections, the report says: “There are concerns over the manoeuvrability of the parking proposed for the dwellings and it considered that the proposal will result in additional traffic which will be to the detriment of Barrack Lane.

“Barrack Lane is a single-track road without a footpath. It is used by resident schoolchildren, joggers and dog walkers. More traffic will make it more dangerous.”

Parking

Church Aston and Lilleshall councillor Andrew Eade, who issued a “call-in” notice requesting that the application be decided in public by the committee instead of by planning officers, “objected to the mass and scale of the proposal in relation to neighbouring properties”, the report says.

He also raised concerns over parking and the drainage of the half-acre site, it adds.

Lilleshall Parish Council, the report says, “raised concerns that the buildings are too close to the road, which would result in parked vehicles obstructing the narrow, private road in Barrack Lane and creating visibility concerns for passing traffic”.

A statement, submitted by Advance Land and Planning Ltd on behalf of PSL managing director Paul O’Neil, says: “The property, which is currently unoccupied, is in a ‘tired’ condition and in need of upgrading and refurbishment.”

The two bungalows created by the split “will be provided with a couple of frontage parking spaces and each will have private rear amenity spaces, well in excess of the council’s guidelines”, it says, while both new houses “would benefit from large, well-screened rear garden and each have four parking spaces clear of the land, which exceeds the council’s minimum requirement”.

Telford & Wrekin Council’s planning committee will discuss the proposal on Wednesday.