Mornings Mill Farm Eastbourne Road, Willingdon, EASTBOURNE, BN20 9NY

comprehensive development of a mixed-use urban extension comprising up to 700 dwellings including affordable housing, 8,600 square metres of employment floorspace, medical centre, school, community centre, retail, playing fields, children’s play space, allotments, amenity open space, internal access roads, cycle and footpath routes and associated landscaping and infrastructure

Authority: Wealden District Council
Appeal type: major · Planning Appeal
Procedure: Inquiry
Development: residential · Major dwellings
Inspector: Boniface M

Main issues, as the Inspector framed them

Whether the site is a suitable location for the proposed development, having regard to planning policy
The effect on local highways, with particular regard to whether safe and suitable access arrangements would be achieved
Flood risk and drainage
The effect on European Protected Habitats
The effect on the character and appearance of the area, including landscape and visual impacts

What decided it

The substantial benefits of the scheme, including much-needed market and affordable housing, were not significantly and demonstrably outweighed by the very limited harm identified, and the proposal accorded with the development plan taken as a whole.

The substantial benefits of the scheme (housing including affordable housing, economic benefits, open space/sports provision and biodiversity net gain) outweighed the very limited weight attached to conflict with out-of-date policies GD2 and DC17 and the limited localised landscape and visual harm

Plan policies cited: Policy WCS4, Policy GD2, Policy DC17, Policy EN1, Policy EN2, Policy TR3, Policy TR13, SPO7, SPO15, Policy WCS7, Policy WCS14, Policy EN8, Policy EN15, Policy CS1, Policy WCS12, Policy EN27, SPO13, Policy EN29, Policy WCS13, Policy EN12, Policy EN14, Policy LR3, SPO9, SPO2, Policy TR16, Policy CS2

Read the decision letter on the Inspectorate’s site

The main issues and the deciding factor are read from the published letter by Town Planner Pro; the letter itself is the record. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Research, not advice.