Affordable homes plan for former pub site is approved
A housing development on a former pub site near Shrewsbury will go ahead after a council planning committee ignored the recommendations of officers to reject the scheme.
It means a total of 10 new homes, including six ‘affordable’ properties, will be built on land which once formed the car park of the Hare and Hounds pub in Cruckton before it was destroyed by a fire in 2011.
A row over whether the site formed part of the settlement of Cruckton or whether it was in open countryside was key to the scheme’s approval – with a recommendation from Shropshire Council’s planning officer that the application should be refused due to it being out of character with the open countryside.
But the authority’s Southern Planning Committee took a different view, with councillors agreeing that the former pub was indeed part of the “dispersed settlement” of Cruckton, and by no means as remote as the planning officer’s report had suggested.
Local member Councillor Roger Evans, for Longden, said planning officers had made what he described as a “fundamental misconception” about the nature of Cruckton village.
“Is the site located in Cruckton? It most definitely is,” he said.
“Some officers have interpreted that anything outside of the urban centres is open countryside and not part of the settlement, which is what we have here.
“This to my mind is a very narrow view and this is the reason why this type of [affordable] housing is in very, very short supply. We need it, Shropshire needs it, potential residents need it.”
Councillor Ed Potter for Loton added that the site, which had been derelict since the closure of the pub over a decade ago, was “infamous” in the local area.
“I’m pleased to see the affordable element here which is desperately needed in our rural communities west of Shrewsbury,” he said.
“Looking at the site, although the houses at the back make me slightly uncomfortable because of their location not in a linear settlement, it’s very difficult to see [a problem with] utilising a site which has been an eyesore and a blot on our countryside for a decade.”
A motion proposed by Councillor Andy Boddington for Ludlow North to go against the advice of planning officers, on the basis that the proposal delivers affordable housing on a site which was in need of redevelopment, was approved by a majority vote of 8-2.
A section 106 agreement to ensure the affordable homes were sold at discounted rate to buyers with a local connection was added as a condition of approval.
