Developers have been refused planning permission for 140 homes next to a popular countryside walk east of Bristol. The plans included building the housing estate on eight hectares of fields in between Hanham and the River Avon footpath. Redrow and Ashfield Land were hoping to build the homes south of Hencliffe Way, on land known locally as the Batch.
This site is protected as Green Belt land, which is countryside lying next to a city, and the protection was why South Gloucestershire Council refused permission. Access to the housing estate would have been built by knocking down a house on Hencliffe Way and building a new road into the fields. Most of the homes would have been two-storey houses, with a few apartments, too.
Read more: Bristol council paying millions more to ‘profit-making companies’ to care for children Read more: Bristol schools funding black hole almost £50 million despite government bailout In a decision notice, the council said: “The application site is located outside the defined limits of development, within the open countryside where development is strictly controlled. The residential development is of a scale and type that is not appropriate in this location. “The site is within the open countryside and is part of a network of green infrastructure, with intervisibility to and from the east and to the south-east, including from public rights of way on site and in the vicinity.
The development will result in the loss of the open character and harm.