®Planning appeal decision
Land Adjacent to 3 High View Court, Drayton Road, Sutton Courtenay, Abingdon, OX13 4HB
Planning appeal 3353334 at Land Adjacent to 3 High View Court, Drayton Road, Sutton Courtenay, Abingdon, OX13 4HB (Vale of White Horse District Council) was dismissed on 28 March 2025 by Inspector Stephens K, by written representations. The main issue, as the Inspector framed it: Whether the appeal site would be a suitable location for housing with regard to local and national policies.
erection of a self-build infill dwelling and associated infrastructure
- Authority
- Vale of White Horse District Council
- Appeal type
- minor · Planning Appeal
- Procedure
- Written Representations
- Development
- residential · Minor Dwellings
- Inspector
- Stephens K
- Postcode
- OX14 4HB
Main issues, as the Inspector framed them
- Whether the appeal site would be a suitable location for housing with regard to local and national policies
- Whether sufficient information has been provided regarding the effect of the proposed development on archaeological remains
What decided it
The appeal site is located in the countryside outside the villages of Drayton and Sutton Courtenay in an unsuitable location for housing that would undermine the Council's spatial strategy and promote unsustainable patterns of development reliant on private car use.
The modest benefits of self-build housing contribution, economic benefits during construction, and biodiversity net gain were significantly and demonstrably outweighed by the serious planning objections arising from the unsuitable countryside location, conflict with spatial strategy, poor sustainability, and insufficient archaeological information.
What the Inspector cited
- Development plan policies
- Core Policy 3Core Policy 4Core Policy 33Core Policy 35Development Policy 1Development Policy 39Policy SC17 of the Sutton Courtenay Neighbourhood Plan
- National Planning Policy Framework
- Paragraph 207Paragraph 218
- Judgments
- Julian Wood v SSCLG and Gravesham Borough Council [2015] EWCA Civ 195
How the Inspector dealt with each one is set out in the app, in order: the development plan, national policy, housing land supply, other considerations and the planning balance, beside the letter.
See how each was appliedThe decision letter
Town Planner Pro holds this letter. The Appeals plan opens it and every other letter we hold, all of them searchable, with the main issues and what decided each case picked out. We do not show letters on the free site because they carry people’s names and addresses.
With an account
What an account adds to this decision
More decisions in Vale of White Horse
The authority’s record since 2016 · every decision in 2025
- Allowed11 September 20266005108Land West of Little Smiths Farm, Drayton, OX14 4JP
- Dismissed10 July 20266008237Land at Downs Close, Downs Close, Harwell, OX11 0LP
- Dismissed7 July 20266004667Land to the South of Cottage Farm, Cottage Road, Stanford in the Vale, SN7 8HY
- Dismissed21 May 20266003590Woodland Farm, Appleton Road, Longworth, OX13 5EF
- Dismissed22 April 2026600442529 Oxford Lane, Grove, Wantage, Oxfordshire, OX12 7PL
The main issues, what decided it, the planning balance and the policies and judgments listed as cited are read from the published letter by Town Planner Pro and are our summary, not the Inspector’s words; the letter itself is the record. Contains public sector information licensed under the Open Government Licence v3.0. Research, not advice.