Awre café, shop and home approved for touring caravan site

Seven Valley Touring provides 16 pitches in the village of Awre (file photo)

A café approved for construction at a caravan site will "provide an essential meeting place" for local people.

The café, a shop and a new home will be built at the Seven Valley Touring site at Awre, in the Forest of Dean.

Joanne Greening, who runs the company, said the changes would also reduce car journeys and make the village more self-reliant.

Councillors at the district council voted to approve the plans on Thursday by 29 votes in favour.

Ms Greening has run the caravan site since May 2016, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service. 

She said the three-bedroom home would allow managers to live and work on site, allowing the company to sustain the level of customer service that she wanted to provide.

But her plans had been opposed by planning officers who said a business of her size - with 16 pitches - would not need managers to live on site.

They said the proposals went against local and national policies and, as a result, the development management committee sent the scheme to be considered by full council.

After debating the need for the home, Ms Greening was granted permission to build the property along with parking and landscaping improvements. There were two abstentions.