Green belt Traveller pitch decision delayed by Three Rivers District Council (From Watford Observer)

Green belt Traveller pitch decision delayed by Three Rivers District Council

9:06pm Thursday 18th March 2010 in

• Skip social links
• Print
• Email
• Comments(1)

Councillors have delayed a decision on whether or not to allow the building of an official gipsy and traveller pitch on Green Belt land near Carpenders Park.

Three Rivers District Council had been advised by its expert planning officers to grant the building of a mobile home on land off Little Oxhey Lane – to help it meet government targets.

The council, like many other local authorities in the country, is under government orders to provide additional accommodation sites for travelling families.

Its development control committee, however, ruled at a meeting this evening that a decision could not be made until its members had visited the site.

Council leader Ann Shaw said: “I think this is a very difficult and very sensitive planning application. It is absolutely vital that we don’t make a decision on this before we know what we are talking about. I would like to suggest that we go on a site visit.”

Councillor Shaw’s proposal was agreed by her fellow committee members, who will now arrange to tour the site before making a final decision at a meeting next month.

A council report, prepared to brief committee members, had included a detailed explanation of the reasoning behind the advice. It read: “Such development, as proposed in this planning application, is normally considered inappropriate within the Metropolitan Green Belt.

“However, the general need to provide gipsy and traveller accommodation within Three Rivers District and Hertfordshire county - in conjunction with the personal needs of the Jordans [the family behind the application] - are considered to amount to very special circumstances that outweigh any material harm caused to the Metropolitan Green Belt.”