Land at Gooseberry Fields Campsite, Smarden Road, Pluckley Thorne, TN27 0RE

residential development for up to six dwellings

Authority: Ashford Borough Council
Appeal type: minor · Planning Appeal
Procedure: Written Representations
Development: residential · Minor Dwellings
Inspector: Simms S

Main issues, as the Inspector framed them

Whether the site is suitable for development, having regard to its location, the proposed land use and the amount of development

What decided it

The Council's inability to demonstrate a five-year supply of deliverable housing land (4.39 years) engaged the presumption in favour of sustainable development, and the benefits of housing delivery were not significantly and demonstrably outweighed by adverse impacts.

The benefits of six windfall dwellings contributing to housing land shortage and local economic benefits outweighed any adverse impacts, assessed against the policies in the Framework as a whole, in the context of a shortfall in five-year housing land supply

Framework references: 11, 110, 115, 129, 135, 139

Plan policies cited: Policy SP1, Policy HOU5, Policy ENV3a, Policy SP6, Policy H1, Policy H2

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.

What an account adds

Draw a red line around your site and the appraisal follows.

Heritage. Listed buildings by grade and distance, conservation areas, scheduled monuments, registered parks and gardens, heritage at risk.
Landscape and environment. Green belt, national parks and national landscapes, SSSIs, ancient woodland, SPA, SAC and Ramsar sites, nutrient catchments.
Flooding. Flood zones 2 and 3, surface water, and both again with climate change.
Transport. The 800 metre station catchment and service frequency, bus stops with their weekday frequency, the cycle network, and the Framework’s transport tests measured for the site.

Then the development plan position, the housing land supply as an Inspector last accepted it, and every appeal decided around the site with its letter.

Every English appeal since 2016, with the letter behind it wherever the Inspectorate published one. Searched by meaning as well as by words, with the key case law counted live across the letters.

Casework that chases the deadlines. Applications, appeals and conditions with their statutory dates.

The judgement stays yours. The tool gathers the material and dates it.