Agenda item

Report of the Assistant Director Planning – Community Development Services

Considered :-

The Assistant Director Planning – Community Development Services sought determination of a planning application for Full Planning Permission for the installation of access control bollards, construction of planters, and block paving to roadway on land to the front of former Council offices at Crescent Gardens, Harrogate, North Yorkshire.

The Principal Development Management Officer advised Members that one addition representation had been received by the authority since publication of the agenda pack.  This related to a request for Members to consider deferment of the application, to allow time for their consideration of the Harrogate Town Centre Strategy and Masterplan and Harrogate Conservation Area Appraisal and pending negotiations between North Yorkshire Council and Impala Estates Limited on the medium to long term potential for Crescent Gardens Park.

Patrick Turner spoke objecting to the application.

The applicant’s agent, Hamish Robertshaw, spoke in support of the application.

During consideration of the above application, the Committee discussed the following issues:-

·        Although public vehicular traffic would be prohibited by the introduction of the bollards and planters, would pedestrians, cyclists and horses still be allowed to access the building frontage.

·        If the car park known as the Shelf was owned by the applicant and not North Yorkshire Council.

·        Clarification was requested on the amount of cycle parking stands currently within the area, if any of these would be for the use of the general public; and whether a condition could be added, if planning permission were to be granted, to move the current cycle stand to another area of the site so that the public would have use of them.

·        In terms of congestion, would the planters and bollards impact the operation of the area and was there the potential for the proposed change to lead to congestion on Swan Road or Ripon Road.  Members also queried if the Council’s Transport team had conducted any modelling or if there was any transport data to support the conclusion within the report, that the development would not impact on the operation of the highway network.

·        Members requested clarification on the process and timescales for an application to be made to the Secretary of State for a Stopping up Order and the methods used for publicising any such application.

·        It was queried that if a Stopping up Order were to be approved could the public right of way be extinguished by Impala Estates Limited.

·        Members queried the rationale behind the decision taken by Cabinet of Harrogate Borough Council in July 2022 to dispose of the land, which was conditional upon the proposed purchaser obtaining a Stopping up Order on the highway.

·        Members did not feel that they had sufficient information to make an informed decision, and that in view of a potential application to the Secretary of State for a Stopping up Order, which if granted would allow for a public right of way to be extinguished, there was a need to understand the full consequences of granting the planning application. 

The decision:-

That the planning application be DEFERRED for the following reasons:

• To allow clarity to be sought from Impala Estates Limited on the scope of a potential Stopping up Order application under s247 of the Town and Country Planning Act 1990, and in particular if the order would apply to vehicular access only. 
• To allow officers to source the July 2022 report taken to the Cabinet of Harrogate Borough Council (HBC) which set out the background and reasons relating to the proposed disposal of Crescent Gardens Road, fronting the former HBC office building at Crescent Gardens.  

Voting record:-

A vote was taken, and the motion was carried unanimously.  The motion to defer the application was therefore carried.