Meeting documents

Ms C Kelham, Senior Planning Officer, stated that the application was for the construction of a new nursery with capacity for 52 children in the village of Haddenham on Aston Road.  Ms Kelham provided a presentation and highlighted the following:

• A map of the site location.
• The land was not part of the Haddenham St Mary’s School, but was adjacent to it. 
• The conservation area.
• The site of the new residential development for 280 homes off Aston Road.
• A footway along the length of Aston Road, which would improve pedestrian accessibility within the area, was required as a condition of the new housing development. 
• The application site was part of a larger 5 hectare site which was considered for housing and economic development as part of the supporting evidence for the emerging Vale of Aylesbury Local Plan (VALP); the larger site outlined in brown was not allocated in the VALP; the southern part of this site was identified as a prominent landscape and open break in the village footprint and added to the local character with exposed to views from the south to the Chilterns.
• The application site was only a small site of 0.32 hectares and would result in a small loss of open land on Aston Road in the north-west corner, but it would not affect the southern part of the site. 
• The layout of the proposed development including car parking spaces, drop-off spaces and internal two metre wide pedestrian footway. 
• A buggy store and nursery play area would be provided. 
• A hedge was proposed along the eastern and south eastern boundary of the site.
• The nursery would operate from 7.00 am to 7.00 pm, Monday to Friday for 51 weeks of the year.
• Drawings of the buildings and photos of the site from different angles.
• A heritage expert had been consulted regarding the listed building near the proposed entrance and had raised no objection.
• The cars parked on Aston Road; no concerns had been raised from the Highways Authority regarding the capacity of the local highway network.

Public speaking

The Chairman invited Ms A Cheeseman to present her statement on behalf of the residents of Aston Road, appended to the minutes.

Members of the committee raised and discussed the following points:

• A member of the committee queried where Ms Cheeseman thought the nursery should be located.  Ms Cheeseman added that there were three large housing developments in Haddenham but the nursery was proposed in an open space storing carbon and asked why it was not being located on the site of one of the large housing developments.
• A member of the committee requested clarification from the officers on whether the people travelling to the primary school would impact on the nursery school movements.  Ms Kelham confirmed that the school and nursery would have different hours of operation but was unsure if the school ran a breakfast club, although a breakfast club would be likely to start at 8.00 am.
• A member of the committee commented that there would be 12 drop- off and pick up spaces along with 18 car parking spaces for staff so the cars would not need to be parked on Aston Road.  However, Miss Kelham acknowledged that the nursery car parking/drop off spaces would not address the existing impact of the primary school in the village but it should mitigate the impact of the proposed development.  The situation would not be worse as the hours of operation were different.
• Following a query on whether the nursery was a ‘business’ and why it was being considered at this Committee; it was confirmed that BCC was the applicant and it was proposed to be located on the site adjoining the existing school.  Ms Kelham explained that BCC had a statutory duty to ensure that, as far as reasonably possible, there was sufficient childcare for children aged from 0 to 14 or up to 16 for disabled children. Mrs Caprio stated that Regulation 3 enabled the Development Control Committee to determine applications which were for County Council promoted developments, brought forward by the Schools Place Commissioning team to enable them to provide sufficient places. 
• In response to a member of the committee asking if there was a need for sequential testers to identify the facilities/need in the area; Ms Winkels confirmed the Schools Commissioning Team had to provide nursery places as there was a shortfall in the area due to the development in the area, as explained by Ms Campbell-Balcombe in the previous item.
• A member of the committee asked if the planting of the hedge could be an early requirement.  Ms Kelham stated that the requirement in condition 10 was for the hedge to be planted along the south-east and eastern boundary in the first planting season following the commencement of the development to enable them to grow successfully. If development should commence in April the next suitable season would be in the following autumn.  The committee member asked if the condition could be amended to state "as soon as possible"; however, Mr Periam clarified that the condition stated "the first planting season" which was the earliest the planting could be carried out.

Mrs Caprio clarified that the Committee was being asked to approve application number CC/0042/19 subject to the conditions/reasons set out in Appendix A with the additional comments about the hedge.

The Chairman invited the Committee members to vote on the application and it was unanimously agreed.

RESOLVED:  The Development Control Committee APPROVED application CC/0042/19 for the construction of a standalone nursery building with associated hard and soft play space, soft landscaping and car parking, subject to the conditions/reasons set out in Appendix A with the additional comments about the hedge.