Housing estate plans rejected over road safety fears

Plans for a 23-home development on land off Cocker Lane in Moss Side, Leyland, have been rejected

Plans to build a new housing estate have been rejected by councillors amid concerns it could pose a danger to children walking to and from a school.

An application for a 23-home development on land off Cocker Lane in Moss Side, Leyland, was rejected by South Ribble Borough Council's planning committee.

The Friends of Cocker Lane group said they were "relieved" by the decision but were prepared to "fight on" in the event of an appeal.

Chris Betteridge, acting on behalf of the applicants, said the development came with "a number of improvements to Cocker Lane…which will enhance [it] and provide a safer route for all users – not just those of the proposed development".

He said it would be particularly beneficial for the schoolchildren who currently have "no choice but to walk in the road", the Local Democracy Reporting Service reported.

The committee was told that up to 150 children used Cocker Lane to get to and from school at any one time, usually walking in the road, due to the lack of a footpath between the junction with Birchwood and the proposed development site.

Resident Adrian Dean said a proposed 1.8m-wide pavement was not enough to "safely accommodate the hundreds of school children that walk the lane every school day".

Mother-of-two Abigail Saunders quoted a comment from Moss Side Primary headteacher Andrew Wright, in which he said the estate created a scenario "where an accident is near-certain to occur involving children, either outside our school or on the roads close by".

Addressing committee members, Ms Saunders said: "Are you happy to roll the dice…with my child's life?"

A plan submitted on behalf of applicant BW SIPP Trustees Ltd proposed the creation of a continuous pavement on the south side of Cocker Lane, to replace the narrow grass verge that currently exists, along with the removal of the equivalent strip of greenery on the north side to allow the road to be slightly widened.

Cocker Lane resident Michael Johnson told members that if a grass verge was removed as part of the plans then residents would need to stand in the road to trim their hedgerows.

Mr Johnson described it as "a plan that might seem to fit on a piece of paper, but is hazardous in practice".

The proposal was refused on the grounds it would have a "detrimental" impact on the character of the immediate area, after councillors were advised it would be difficult to defend a rejection on road safety grounds as highways bosses at Lancashire County Council were satisfied with the plans.

However, the meeting heard it had taken seven reworkings of the blueprint to persuade the county council that the largely pavement-free route could be made safe for both construction traffic and the increase in vehicles generated by the new homeowners.

Mark Devenish, a consultant from SCP acting on behalf of the applicant, told the committee that the repeated rethinks surrounding the road layout were a positive and it was normal for several revisions of a scheme to be submitted.

'Inappropriate application'

Moss Side ward councillor Michael Green said this was "probably the most inappropriate application" he had ever seen in nearly 20 years representing the area.

He said the design "effectively shoehorns the scheme into the locality as tightly as you could possibly imagine".

Councillor Phil Smith said his concerns about the plans had only been strengthened by a site visit after members deferred a decision at the last committee meeting.

Councillor Elaine Stringfellow said she had seen children wearing headphones and looking down at their phones while walking in the road which left her thinking "how much better it would be if there was a pathway there…that was continuous".

Permission was refused by six votes to two on character and visual appearance grounds.