Cheshire East have granted permission for the outbuilding at Finlows Bower Farm in Over Alderley to be re-sited.
The controversial development at Finlows Bower Farm includes the domestic outbuilding and neighbouring tennis court, which are visible from The Edge, and lie within the Green Belt and an area of County Value for Landscape. They were constructed, along with the two sets of entrance gates, without planning permission.
The timber frame of the building will be disassembled and sited on new foundations within the area of the garden curtilage. The present site of the outbuilding will then be landscaped and grassed in order to reinstate its former appearance as part of a paddock.
Christopher Widger, Countryside Manager at the National Trust, said "Moving the building to the north will have little effect upon its visual impact, including in terms of views from the land that the public has access to at Alderley Edge - the impact from the popular visitor viewpoint at Stormy Point would be little changed as a result of moving the outbuilding as proposed.
"The proposal remains contrary to Green Belt Policy given its adverse impact upon openess - in Green Belt terms the proposal remains 'inappropriate development' and no very special circumstances have been identified that would justify a departure from the normal approach to such a development."
The approved planning application (11/0226M) was a resubmission of the retrospective application 10/2972M, which was refused in October last year.
Cheshire East approved the application stating "the proposal complies with the relevant policies of the Development Plan and is considered to be acceptable and "the visual impact of the proposal on the character and appearance of the area is considered to be acceptable."
The domestic outbuilding must be relocated within 2 months, unless otherwise agreed in writing by the Local Planning Authority.
An application for alterations to, and the retention of, the two pairs of entrance gates and associated screen planting at Finlow Bowers Farm was refused on March 23rd. This most recent application for the entrance gates, 11/0249M, was a retrospective planning application for retention of both pairs of gates which proposed to lower the height of all four sandstone gateposts by 300mm. This is the second retrospective planning application relating to the entrance gates on Mottram Road because application 10/1691M for the retention of one pair of gates was refused in August 2010.
Cheshire East Council have refused the application because "The retention of the two pairs of entrance gates with associated pillars, flank walls and close boarded fence sited along the boundary with Mottram Road, by reason of their size, siting and design, would form a visually obtrusive feature which would detract from the rural character and appearance of the Green Belt and Area of Special County Value within which they are located."
Earlier in the year a retrospective planning application for the engineering works which were carried out to level the land at Finlows Bower Farm to create the tennis court was also refused.
Application 10/3342M related to the area of paddock which has been covered with a hard surface to create a tennis court and proposed to remove the hard surface and replant the levelled area so it could then be used as a lawn tennis court for a maximum period of 28 days in any calendar year.
Cheshire East Council refused the retrospective application because it was deemed "an inappropriate form of development within the Green Belt, as defined by the Development Plan" and "would cause harm to the objectives of those policies by virtue of engineering operations that would fail to safeguard the countryside from domestic encroachment."
The Council considered that no special circumstances exist to justify the approval of the tennis court, which they deem is inappropriate development in the Green Belt.
Comments
Here's what readers have had to say so far. Why not add your thoughts below.
So, can I again request of the Council that, as a local, law-abiding and paying resident that non-compliant constructions are bulldozed and the land remediated at the owners' expense whether it is a Rafael or a Rooney, a Toure or a Tevez that live there or that it was developed by a 'Huntjones' or whoever or that it has 'Falcon & Naff' appliances. None is relevant. So why is this not sorted?.
Or, if that's too much to ask, can you liase with colleagues in this 'local joined-up thinking' that is Cheshire East to ask your bin men, sorry if that's not PC, to resist using my bottle recycling bin as a discus, albeit in preparation for 2012, so that is remains, roughly, outside my home?. Please chose the easier but option 1, surely, is a no-brainer.