 Good morning, and welcome to the planning committee today, the eight of November. Good morning, Members, officers and any Members of the public who are viewing livestream. Welcome to South Cambridge District Council Planning Committee. My name is Councillor Martin Khan and I am Chair of the committee. May I ask those who are joining us remotely to ensure that their cameras and microphones remain off unless they are addressing the committee. I'm advised that there will be a brief fire alarm test at 10.30 this morning, so we will briefly pause the meeting at that time, but we won't need to leave the chamber. Committee members present in the chamber, I will invite each of you to introduce yourselves. Members, after I call your name, please turn on your microphone and say your name so that the presence may be noted. As I said earlier, my name is Councillor Martin Cairn and I'm a member for Hisson and Impington Ward. My vice-chair is Councillor Peter Fane. Good morning, Members. Peter Fane, Member for Shelford Ward. Councillor Ariel Cahn. Councillor Ariel Cahn, Member of Hearthstone and Cormarton Ward. Councillor Jeff Harvey. Councillor Lisa Redrup. Good morning. Thank you, Chair. I'm Councillor Lisa Redrup and one of the Members for Hearthstone and Cormarton Ward. Councillor Judith Ripeth. Good morning, Chair. Good morning, everybody. I'm Councillor Judith Ripeth, one of the Members for Milton and Water Beach Ward. Councillor Peter Sanford. Good morning, everyone. Councillor Peter Sanford, one of the Members for Caxton and Pupworth Ward. Councillor Heather Williams. Morning, Chair. Morning, Members. Heather Williams and I represent the Mortons Ward. Councillor Richard Williams. Morning, Chair. My name is Richard Williams. I'm the Member for the Whittlesford Ward. Councillor Eileen Wilson. Good morning, Chair. I'm the Councillor Eileen Wilson for Coddenham and Ransom Ward. I can confirm that the meeting is quarry. We have some officers in the Chamber for the duration of the meeting. Councillor Osavir. We're a big record Smith delivery manager. Good morning, Councillors. I'm Rebecca Smith, delivery manager for Development Management and Compliance. Vanessa Blane, senior planning lawyer. Good morning, Chair. Good morning, everyone. Laurence Damary-Hulman, Democratic Services Officer. Chair, good morning, everyone. Laurence Damary-Hulman and Democratic Services for the Planning Committee. We have technical support from the Democratic Services being provided by Aaron Clark. Sorry, I won't make it on, but yeah. We've also been drawn by various case officers during the meeting. If at any time a member leaves the meeting, would they please make that fact known so that it can be recorded in the minutes? We shall take breaks from this meeting as and when they are needed and as appropriate. I intend this time to hold meeting breaks a bit more frequently because a couple of our members need to have a break during the meeting. Sorry to be back every hour. Members should have received a number of papers for this meeting. You should have received the main agenda pack dated the 31st of October. The plans supplement dated the 1st of November. The Appeals and Compliance reports published the supplements and dated the 1st of November. The update report and two appendices for item 5 in Falmyna published as a supplement on 7th of November. A written submission from a resident has been circulated. The update report from item 6 published as a supplement on 6th of November. If you have not seen any of these documents, please say so now and democratic services will provide you with copies. I would also like to note that site visits were held on the 1st of November for all of the applications on our agenda today. Apologies for the second item. Have we got any apologies for absence lomons? Thank you chair. Two apologies for absence today. One from Councillor Dumfie Hawkins and one from council Bill Hanley, Councillor Dr Lisa Redwps. they've dropped currently set in the substitute today. I believe there's an update on the... ...the new new build... ...ac that's been passed in the levelling up act. Just to give members a brief update. The levelling up and regeneration act was given a loyal ascent on the 26th of October. Llewer, as it's being referred to for short, Os yw gweithio y bywysig o ymgyrchu cyfwyrdeddau o'r systema helynyddu yma, oedd y gweithio y maen nhw'n tynnu cyfnodion, a'r bywysig o'r bydiau o'r maen nhw o'r bywysig, a'r bywysig o'r cyrchu cyfwyrdeddau a'r bywysig o'r bywysig o'r cyfwyrdeddau o'r bywysig o'r cyfwyrdeddau. Yna yw eich ymddangos cyhoedd o'r bywysig o'r bywysig o'r gyfwyrdeddau o'r Sechsham 171b, yw'r Ysgrifennid Gwyl Pwladau Cymru, ddim yn bwysig i'r ddaeth yn ysgrifennid fath o'r enw yn yng ngweithio'r ddaeth, ac mae'r dweud y ddweud o'r Ysgrifennid Gwyl Pwladau Cymru yn yng Nghymru. Yn gweithio'r ysgrifennid, mae'n gallu cynnig o'r ddweud o'r ddechrau, oherwydd cerddur yma yna. Mae'n ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud o'r ddweud. Felly, ond mae'n gwaith gynnwg ar y lefnod 3, boriwn i'r amhwytaith. Roeddwn ni'n gwaith o'r fun â gymhoeddiadau ac o'r ammwysydd yn gorffosi? Roeddwn ni'n gwaith o'r ymdîn i'ch cyhoeddfa, yn geisacht, â'r fawr yw mae'n bwch yn ei gweithio ar hyn. Jeth, Faveth. Rhan o'n oed i hynny'n meddwl ar gyfer gyflym, ond mae'n gwaith iddy nid i mewn cyffredig o'r cyfniadau i'r cywnaeth i ffrindwyr rhaid. However, I know this particular application I learned from attending a sight visit, and from the pages in front of us when I come toaced fresh. Thank you, Chair, yes. In relation to item six that has been called into the committee at my request. I have expressed views on it, I shall withdraw from the committee for that item that I will speak as a local member. Ieithas, yn gyfodol. Thank you very much. The item number five, for a myrdd, an application number.tem. Sorry, item number four, minutes of the previous meeting. Item number four on our agenda is the minutes of the previous meeting, we have the minutes Rwy'n dweud yätzech chi wedi wnaith yn hyd yn ffordd y 11 of octobor. Mae'r ddweud y cwmau fwy o gyd yma wedi ddim yn angen. ym Mennonedd? Mae'r ddweud yn gwneud 26 yma, mae'r ddweud yn gwneud Fwyl ydi'r sgol o'r nifer 5 ar y hoffa ar gael. Mae'n ddiffrwys ynghylchu ar y bydd. A bod yn ni nesaf, oedd eich rhai. Fyfodol. Fyfodol ffodol a'i rhaid o'r rhaid o'r rhaid o rhaid o'r rhaid o'r rhaid. Rhaid o 23.02467. ddechrau i'r llun, dyna ddynnu, i'r anodol yn ddynnu, i ddweud bod y tunydd ffordd mewn gwahanol a'r newid yn ynnymru, ydyn ni i ddweud hefyd mewn cyfwedd, i gyflawnio cyffredinol, byddynau ailigol, gwahanol, cyfrwsfa, ydych chi, b beaches ac ysgol, mewn bilion, gyfrwsfa, ac yn brwyng o'r cyfrwsfa, a'r cyfrwsfa cyfrwsfa cyfwyr, ac mae'r sefydlu yn bwysig ar ei fydd. Mae'r cyfnod iawn er mwynhau'r ddechrau Llywodraeth, argyfodwyr ar y gynrychiadau trinodol, cyfnodol yn cael ei fod yn cynhau a llai yma, yn cael ei ddweud o arddangosol. Mae'r cyfnodol yn ddweud y ddweud, ac yn cael ei ddweud o'r cyfeirio cymaint cyfnodol, y ddweud o'r cyfnodol yn cael ei ddweud o'r cyfeirio cymaint cyfnodol ac yn llwydoedd cyfnodol yn cael eu ddweud o'r cyfnodol. Charlotte Spencer is the presenting officer for Cure Please present the application for us. Thank you chair. I'll just share my screen. Just confirm you can hear me okay and that you can see my screen. Yes we can hear you and see you fine. Thank you Charlotte. Thank you. So this is an application at land at the way Falmyr for a part demolition of existing buildings, new buildings for research and development and associated works the way the application is a committee as a special policy considerations. So just to go through some updates so the updates to the report which were published yesterday and this included the inclusion of the design review panel report as an appendix, the inclusion of the youth engagement report as an appendix and an amendment to the table identifying the existing and proposed footprints floor spaces and heights. That's in paragraph 8.21. These are the changes to the table here. They do not change officer consideration as this was included for information only and it was due to an error in officer measurements due to embedded scales. A third party representation was received by officers this morning from the willows. The resident has previously had previously objected and whilst they raised specifics to conditions no more, no new material considerations have been raised. In addition, I was pointing out that there was a typo in condition 10. So just requesting the rewording of condition 10 to remove this typo. Don't worry, I'm not going to read it all out, but it's essentially removing this shell commence to actually make the sentence make sense. So it shall be development shall not begin other than demolition until a detailed design of the surface water drainage etc. So moving on to the location. So the site comprises 2.2 hectares of previously developed land located to the north of High Street in Felmyr. The site currently comprises industrial warehouse buildings with ancillary offices, units 1, 2, 3 and 4 surrounding a hard surface yard and carpark. And there is also an office building, which is building 5. The access is from the south via the way which is a private road. Residential properties lie to the southeast, south and south west. A small yard lies to the north and then surrounding that is agricultural fields. So just moving on to the constraints. So the bulk of the site, which is outlined here, lies outside the development framework, which is shown by the dotted line here. An awarded watercourse runs along the western boundary and the site lies within flood zones 1, 2 and 3. Parts of the site are also at risk of surface water flooding. The site benefits from a number of mature trees along the western side, and these are subject to tree preservation order. There's also a number of mature trees along the eastern boundary and around building 5. The site is situated mostly adjacent to the Felmyr conservation area, shown by this purple line, partly within. And it's within the setting of a cluster of listed buildings to the south and southwest. And these include St Mary's Church, which is grade 1, and Felmyr House, which is grade 2. Moving on to the proposals. This is showing the existing site plan and the demolition plan. So buildings 2, 3 and 5 would be fully demolished. Building 4 would be partially demolished. And the retainer section of building 4 along with the whole of building 1 would be retained and upgraded. These are just some existing photographs of the site. So the first one is the access road coming in from the way with building 1 here and the car park on the right. This one is just a bit further down. This is further down again, so you've got building 2 here, building 3 here, building 4. This one is of building 4 here, so it's this larger bit that would be retained. The smaller sections would be demolished. Again, we've got building 3 here and part of building 4 here. And the same, but it's just looking the other way, so building 4, building 3, and this is a photo of building 5. So moving on to the proposed site plan. So a two-storey building is proposed to be attached to building 1, which would be retained. In total, this would create five suites. Building 4 would be proposed to be extended to the west here and to the east, and this would create three suites. A new parking area providing 153 spaces is proposed here. And the existing car parking area would be altered to provide 31 spaces, nine of which would be disabled spaces, 18 would be car share spaces and six visitor spaces. All of these would be EV. Cycle store would also be provided in this area. In terms of the proposed floor plan of building 1. Here is proposed to be altered to create lab space, a gym, conference room, cafe and deli at ground floor with office lab and right up space at first floor. And the new building would contain labs at ground floor with office right up space at first floor. This building, extended building 4 would create three suites with labs at ground floor and then the office right up space at first floor. This is also just saying that the proposed roof plan. These tables on the right show the existing and built form. This top table is taken from office measurements and they are approximate. Just showing the footprint floor space and max height of the existing buildings and then of the proposed. The table below shows the total floor space levels and these have been provided by the applicant. So there will be a net uplift in floor space of 4,411 square meters. Moving on to the elevations. So these are the elevations of suites 1 to 5, which is building 1 and the extension to the rear of that to clarify the roof of building 1 to be raised by 0.25 meters. And the height of the new building would be 9.1 meters. The building will be clad in profile cladding, which would be blue and green in colour on the south and west elevation south and east elevation. Sorry. And it will be great on the west and north elevation. Moving on to suites 6 to 8, which is the extended building 4. Again, these will be cladding profile cladding should be blue and green on the south elevation and the west elevation grey on the north and then a mixture on the east. The maximum height of this building will be 10.7 meters. As these just showing the cycle stone substation plans, these will be adjacent to the parking area to the east of building 1. Both would have a height of 3 meters. So just showing some proposed CGI's submitted by the applicant. So this top one is coming as you enter the site from the way. So this is what currently is building 1. So it's suites 1 to 5. And on the side suites 6 to 8. This is the view of suites 2 to 5 from the west. So it's showing the different colour. This is the view coming from the pedestrian access via Green Lane. So this is suites 6 to 8, which was building 4. And then we've got the proposed view of the muse from the south. So this side is suites 1 to 5 and this side is suites 6 to 8. There will also be associated landscaping as demonstrated by these plans here. So there will be some retention of some trees here and some additional new planting. I came in here. Just a brief look at the technical visualisations as shown within the applicants landscape visual impact assessment. These are just the year 1 pictures. So how it would look within the first year of development. So this top one here is from view number 1. And this is taken from Rectory Lane. And this view here was raised by the conservation officer. The view with the greatest impact from within the conservation area. This one here is from the junction of the way and High Street. And the building can just be seen here. This view here is taken from view 4. So it's the junction between Cambridge Road and Falmy Road. Looking across the fields. This one here is taken from this point here. So it's further north along Falmy Road. And then the final one is taken from Orchard Farm up here. So the material considerations of the principle of the development, character and appearance of the area and impact on heritage assets, car parking and highway safety, impact on neighbour amenity, biodiversity and flood risk. The conclusion of the planning balance here and officer recommendation is approval subject to conditions included the amended one of condition 10 and the completion of a section 106 agreement. Thank you, chair. Thank you very much indeed. I'm going to go through. Sorry, have we now come to questions of clarification? Have we any questions of clarification please? Councillor Heather Williams. Thank you, chair. Just throughout the report, obviously parking seems to be quite a key issue for local residents and that's understandable. I know that the high street is particularly narrow and I can and someone people be concerned about more cars in the area. Yet in a few places it suggests that actually through the design process there's been a reduction in the car parking, which I appreciate was a deck. Could you show us or indicate that change and whether there is the capability of increasing parking on the site, please? Hi, yes. I'll bring up my screen again. I wasn't involved in the pre-application discussions. Bear with me here, but I understand from what I've seen from the pre-app that the original proposal was to have a two-story... Sorry, I may share it in. No. I was just wiggling my mouse and I realised that no one could see it. There's a two-story kind of parking block being provided here and from comments from our design team that wasn't suitable in this instance. So, to clarify, the only way to increase the parking would be to go up. There's no other facility on site. Yes, that's correct, yes. Any other questions? Thank you, chair. I just wanted to ask about condition 27, which I think was the travel management parking plan and just some information about how rigorous that could be monitoring and check if people are parking... who are employed at the site or using the site are parking in a way that's causing problems on the way and on the streets and what might be able to be done if that was detected. Yes, so this condition requests the details. I do... We do have Tam Harry, which is the transport assessment officer with us, who might be able to give just a bit more technical detail about what we're expecting to see from that condition. If... That's okay with you, chair, for him to kind of answer that question. Yes, yes. Thank you, Charlotte. Hello, good morning. Yes, I'm Tam Harry, transport assessment team, Cambridge County Council. My understanding is that the parking in the local area, particularly on the high street, will be monitored through the travel plan. So we'll have annual monitoring reports from the travel plan for five years. And if there's any issues in terms of parking on the high street, the travel plan can pick this up. And also, I think, and Falmyr Parish Council, I'm sure, will be in touch with the applicants and the management of the site anyway. And if there is an issue then I've asked for £10,000 in the 106 to be used for the implementation of rating restrictions if parking is on the street and causing trouble, causing difficulties with drive raise, or cars are parked in inappropriate locations. Thank you. I've got a question in terms of the way itself, which is part of the within the application site. But I believe it's a private road. Is there any control of the parking on the way which might be a problem? I don't believe that we can control that because it is a private road. But from what I understand from the applicants and TAMP might be able to confirm, it's not their intention is to keep parking within the dedicated parking areas. Yes, I understand that as well. Thank you. Do you have any further questions or points of clarification? Thank you very much. Now we move on to public speakers. First of all I would like to ask an objector, Sarah Brock, to speak. Thank you. Just to remind you, you have three minutes. We will try and give you a warning when you have 30 seconds to go. But please can you keep your expression to three minutes. Thank you very much. Good morning, councillors. My name is Sarah Brock. I live at Thinehouse the Way, Fowmere. It joins the application site. Together with the willows and the ffurs, which also join the site, we live the closest of anybody to the site. Our home is 11 metres from the boundary. My consultation response made in August this year listed six material considerations which need to be dealt with. Only one is satisfactorily addressed, the effect of new trees on the boundary. Thank you. Three minutes does not allow me to address all the others. I will focus on hours of work and the parking of construction traffic. If you have questions on the others, I'll be happy to respond. The current permitted hours of work for the application site are effectively 7am to 7pm Mondays to Fridays and 7am to 1pm on Saturdays with no working at all on Sundays. This is the effect of the conditions on earlier permissions. In practice, for many years, the site has been closed on Friday afternoons and not worked at all on Saturdays. The result is that the site and its surroundings are very quiet and calm indeed in the evenings and the weekends. In the pre-application consultation carried out by the applicant, they said there would be no Saturday working and that weekday hours would not normally exceed 7am to 7pm. No working was proposed on Saturdays. I asked for hours of work to be imposed. However, there is no such hours of work condition. The nearest we get to one is condition 31, but that appears to relate only to construction and demolition and to plant and power operated machinery. It is at best ambiguous and relates to industrial use, not the operational hours of a modern R&D centre. I turned to the parking of construction traffic. The problem is that construction vehicles are likely to be parked on the way, which is narrow, making it difficult to drive out from Vine House and the FERS. We have to reverse out. The officer's report acknowledges that parking of contractors vehicles needs to be dealt with, but the proposed condition simply requires them to be accommodated within the application site. This is hopeless. The whole of the way is within the application site where we live. Whilst I welcome the redevelopment of the site as an R&D centre, the currently proposed conditions to regulate it are poor and unless they are significantly revised and then return to this committee, permission should not be granted. I therefore, and with regret, object to the grant of permission today. Thank you very much indeed. Do we have any questions for the objective, please? Ofications? No, thank you very much indeed. Now we would like a presentation by the proposed developer, the agent, Mrs Amy Watson from Bidwells. Could you please also make your presentation? You're also on the same point, we'll allow you three minutes. Hi, Ariel will just be using the first minute so he's the applicant and we'll share the three minutes. Thank you. Good morning. My name is Ariel Levy and I'm one of the co-founders of Gentio Real Estate, a family-run life science developer and investor. I'd like to thank the committee for your time today. Over the course of the application we've had three pre-apps a design review panel have met with the parish three times, have had a separate design workshop as well as a public consultation and run a youth engagement program. During the process the officer engagement and advice as well as the design review panel advice has led to positive changes in the design of the scheme. There's a real value to having the collaboration with officers as well as the consulting views of the local community and the social, economic and environmental benefits the scheme offers. A special mention is to be had to the team behind the youth engagement program who meticulously organized a two-day program run with the local primary school in Falmouth. It was inspirational to see the children get involved in the design and we hope to incorporate their designs on the site and in their school. I'm going to hand it over to Amy to discuss the application further but just picking up some of the points. Construction traffic won't be allowed on the way during construction. We can definitely put construction traffic in the actual application boundary and not on the way. And general running of the scheme there won't be any parking on the way as it's the only entrance in and out of the site so no traffic and no cars will be allowed to park on that road and we can put double yellow lines on our boundary if necessary. I'll pot it over to Amy now. Thank you Ariel and thank you to the committee on behalf of the applicant. The proposals for the redevelopment of an existing brownfield industrial site which is physically well related to the village. The committee will be aware of the planning history of the site refusing residential development in 2021 due to the loss of the existing employment use. The proposals retain employment in the village and incorporate community facilities. A cafe, gym and co-working space would be provided which would be open to the public. The applicant has confirmed they would be willing to contribute £87,000 towards the well-worn greenway and £10,000 towards traffic calming measures. The existing industrial site is well contained from the open countryside and the landscape officer has confirmed there will be minimal impact on the views from the surrounding area and the buildings are appropriate for the location and sit in harmony with the setting as confirmed in paragraph 8.23. In terms of water consumption this proposal would use 62% less than the existing site per annum. Climate has been at the heart of the proposals and the energy model shows a reduction of carbon emissions by 30% above building regulations. The proposals are also targeting Briann Excellent. The applicant also agrees to secure a minibus which would allow community use with the details of the service to be agreed via condition 26. The applicant is also happy with the parish council's suggestion to restrict the use of the development to the proposed uses specified within class E. For these reasons outlined above we would respectfully request the committee approve the application. Thank you. Any questions or points of clarification from the developer please? Councillor Heather Williams. Thank you chair. Two things. We've obviously heard that parking is pretty much the key issue for many people and just if what flexibility would you have if there was a problem given the site restrictions how would you resolve that to increase your car parking on site? Because it's all well and good managing it and monitoring it if the problem arises. And the other thing is just I think residents would probably need some more reassurance regarding the animal testing possibilities so we could have a response on those two chair. Thank you. If I just take the animal testing one first we discussed this previously with a case officer and they said that it wasn't a planning consideration and therefore could not deal with that via condition but also there will be no animal testing on site to test animals on site. To test animals on site for R&D requires a very specific and secure site with two access points it's completely different we're targeting biotech companies and companies scaling out of Babrum research campus and other campuses animal testing isn't possible to do on the site it takes large organisations you've got it at Edinburgh but you can't do it on individual sites like this it's too expensive and too impossible to actually deliver on site so from an animal testing perspective there won't be any more happy to also restrict that it just won't happen on site. The parking point. In terms of the parking point can we bring our transport consultant to help with that question? On the parking we actually went through the pre-app design process and design officers and the way to increase it is to actually add the deck where we put the existing car park the reason that we took away the deck and it was actually officer recommendations is because to break up the car parking they wanted trees in the middle and they wanted to make sure that from a suds from a suds perspective there was enough surface drainage water so actually over the three pre-apps it evolved the first pre-app we took away was the parking deck and in pre-apps 2 and 3 the actual space for the car parking evolved which meant that we had to change the routes we added the trees we got rid of all the concrete on the western boundary to make that gravel based so that in the future if the minibus is proving very successful we can actually get rid of more parking rather than ad parking there isn't on site we've tried to maximise it as best as possible whilst adhering to the other conditions that we need to prepare if I can just add to that as well in terms of the policy consideration the policy relates to B1 it obviously doesn't incorporate class E it's not that up to date ours is life science use it's not a traditional office use and so we'll have a lower quantum of parking associated with it compared to that office use that's why it doesn't quite neatly fit in that scenario but our transport consultant is comfortable with the numbers and we propose that they will be sufficient to meet the needs of the development Happy, any other? Heather Williams Chair, some of this might be for officers because I feel that I'm being told what told an officer position here but I think the parking obviously is I appreciate the same design but what I've not heard is that if there is a parking problem what flexibility there is to deal with if I've so far been told I don't need to worry about it and I don't think that really gives myself or residents any comfort chair As part of the travel plan which has to be submitted we're going to incorporate the transport and parking restrictions in the actual leases of the buildings so as part of the five year plan to monitor the travel plan leasing space on this development will have parking restrictions in their leases so if we can find that actually people are breaking those parking restrictions parking on the main high street we can actually enforce against them as part of their lease so in terms of teeth to bite against people abusing the position of the high street we actually have ways as part of the development to restrict that so people doing that can be taken action against that Lisa Redfield Sorry, thank you chair I just wanted to raise the question of night time noise that I think the parish council and the resident we heard from raised I think there was concern that there might be increased noise at night that might cause a disturbance I just wondered if there were any plans in place to help with that Was that noise in terms of people or noise in terms of equipment and machinery I'm afraid I'm not quite sure there was a concern about 2 decibel I think it's to do with equipment we had a noise assessment which actually assessed the noise and it found that it was within in policy and I think that the council's position environmental health also agreed that it goes below the decibel count to actually constitute noise for the machinery and equipment on site a lot of it's house within the building we've actually left a platform specific in each R&D centre to house a lot of the noisier equipment but also the equipment on the plan deck has dampers and sort of noise insulation protection on the equipment itself so from a noise perspective we don't think that it should go above the levels that we've actually put in the report and we can then test it once the site's operational to ensure that it doesn't go above agreed thresholds Thank you chair I just note from our report page 40 paragraph 8.103 about the cafe in the gym being open to members of the public I'm just wondering what the capacity because normally this would be something for the people on there and it's public is welcome but what sort of capacity envisage that being is obviously that's something that residents are concerned about because from the parking perspective I appreciate the enforcement obviously those using the gym and the cafe might not fall in the same category the gym in itself is not a very large gym it's important to have something of a facility like that for people actually working on these R&D centres and campuses so that they can exercise if they want it will be open to the public on appointment only because it's not a commercial gym you can book in to do sort of PT sessions as and when you want so from a gym perspective we don't think that should increase the amount of traffic on to site from the public on the cafe and it's key and necessary for R&D campuses to have somewhere where people can get hot food in the morning and lunch times in terms of capacity for the public it won't be widely advertised it's very difficult for us to enforce who comes to site, who comes to the cafe or not what we can do is just ensure that opening hours of the cafe respect the local boundary and to make sure that those are restricted that they don't know it doesn't become very very busy on the weekend for example when the actual campus is in operation and not in operation thank you very much sorry councillor Richard great thank you chair just a quick question really on the travel plan because I think the travel plan seems quite key in managing the parking issue the proposed minibus links really run north south rather than east west so I think you're proposing minibus on north south and ride in Toxton which is of course a north south essentially north south train line so I was just wondering why there's nothing east west because if you're wanting to travel to the site from Wittlesford, Great Abingdon anywhere over there there really won't be any option other than for the car so what's the thinking behind the north south so trumpington back in the morning and the evening so that's once because that's further away so we do that once we come to that we can either come in the morning and leave in the evening Foxon is our nearest train station so that's the reason the proposed route was agreed there actually as part of our thinking Wittlesford is a really key station so what we're going to do and that's why it's important to have a dynamic service is to actually amend that close to the time to ensure that it goes to both Foxon and Wittlesford at separate times and goes to trumpington once in the morning and once in the evening but we will pick up both stations at this time and it's that there's a condition attached to the suggested and the condition 26 for the actual details of the service and the route and the timings so that can be discussed and agreed at a later stage thank you very much indeed now we have the parish council Mr Councillor David Brock from Farmer Parish Council again it's a you have three minutes and please report it but do you have your consent of your parish council to speak thank you chair yes I am authorised I've been nominated by the committee of Farmer Parish Council to present to you today and to represent the council good morning councillors I am the chair of the planning committee of Farmer Parish Council I should say I do live next door to the site of course I declared an interest at a very early stage in our council's consideration and I have a dispensation I'm also a retired planning solicitor I've advised South Cambridge District Council in the past and from 2016 to 2022 I was a member of the planning inspectorate's panel of persons qualified to deal with applications for planning commission for nationally significant infrastructure projects and I served as an examining inspector Farmer Parish Council explained its concerns in our 15 page consultation response in three minutes I cannot possibly address them all but I want to take one very important example which has already been touched on by you councillors and which illustrates an overall problem which I'm sorry to say is there I'll happily address any others that you want me to deal with if you have any questions the example is of course car parking we drew attention to the problem in our consultation response to meet policy TI3 will require between 230 and 385 spaces only 184 are to be provided the shortfall therefore is between 46 and 201 spaces where are as a minimum 46 apparently is the maximum 201 cars going to park the temptation is like to be in the way on the high street and probably elsewhere in the village so we have heard about a parking management plan which is recommended the parking management plan does not yet exist I would say that Mr Levy has outlined what he considers will be in it and we think that is good the parking management plan is to be submitted under condition 27 contribution we've heard of £10,000 to parking restrictions also known as WLIs which will be secured by the section 106 agreement but when I turn when you turn councillors to condition 27 you will see it doesn't give a purpose for the plan it ought to be stating that there is to be no off-site parking and no parking on the way but we go on it does not have a feedback and revision mechanism neither is monitoring but as one of the councillors observed just a few moments ago there is no provision no proper provision for revised measures if the monitoring tells us that there is parking taking place outside the site in the places where it should not be may I say there is an equivalent feedback and revision provision in the ecology condition or if it is in this condition other recommended conditions I'm afraid have other problems of enforceability they include condition 6 8.4 which includes a lift from the county council county council's response and simply says please include wording that and then is a long list condition 12, 26, 28 and 31 I'm about to conclude these are not just drafting issues they are substantive problems to conclude many of the matters which we raised have not been addressed in a satisfactory manner or at all family parish council is supportive of the development we like what we hear from Mr Levy and his company however those things are not being dealt with properly through the conditions and therefore regrettably because the conditions are inadequate in our view permission should not be granted at this point in time we need to go back need to be revised and therefore sadly with considerable regret at this stage we object to the grant of permission I'm happy to answer any questions which the committee may have Do we have any questions please council Williams I'll be honest just for ease of my scrolling through you mentioned the ecology do you have the number of that condition just because I'm scrolling up and down it wasn't one of the ones which I had an issue with so I haven't got it straight off and my computer has a lockdown so I'm afraid I can't get to it it's condition 18 Councillor Radra sorry I didn't quite catch all the conditions that you had a problem with I just wondered if you could repeat that the problem conditions include condition 6 which is surface water runoff condition 8.4 which contains just completely inappropriate words which mean nothing and indicate that more needs to be written I'm afraid sorry I said 8.4 condition 8.4 condition 12 which is about the colour of heat pumps and simply doesn't go on and say having made the point that the colour of the heat pumps and some other things is important but one can change the colour of these things at will there are permitted development rights for it needs to deal with that minibus service is silent in the condition as to where the minibuses are going to run the street furniture and artwork provision is great it brings in the stuff which has been done by Falmer Primary School but doesn't deal with its ongoing retention and what was it? 12, 26 28 is sorry 28th Street first floor and then the hours operation condition is condition 31 thank you very much for your time now Rebecca White would like to make some comments on the parking issues thank you chair it's okay it's Smith, Rebecca Smith but anyway I was just going to come back in terms of the conditions that have been referred to condition 31 relates to the construction and demolition hours rather than hours of use we have had a look at the previous commission from 1995 which actually doesn't have an hours of use condition on relating to the site and its operation it has hours of deliveries and it has hours in terms of noise and levels of noise from the plant and machinery but there is actually on the original permission no restrictions on the hours of use of the industrial estate from the 1995 permission so working through those other conditions that have been referred to condition 28 it does refer to the installation so that the details so the condition sorry, I'm getting words in the wrong order the condition relates to details to be submitted and then that the development should be installed in accordance with those details so we could amend to include and maintained as such thereafter however that is not usual wording that we reduced because but we could amend if committee wished to do so condition 26 refers to the minibus service and actually requests all of those details including the number of services and as the applicants refer to the details of where the minibus service is going to run to will be included to be submitted as part of that condition condition 12 that was referred to apologies I could not quite clear what the issue was with that condition I think Charlotte has got some information that she can come back on regarding condition 8 and the final one was condition 6 apologies again if you could clarify what the issue was with condition 6 and then I can have a look at the wording thank you condition 12 I'll take a nod or shake the head if I get it wrong I think it was that permitted development rights would enable you to change colour and that sort of thing I think potentially they could but this application requires the details to be submitted so once we've approved the details they have to be installed in accordance with those details so if they wanted to change them at a later date then they unfortunately the wording on that condition says that development should be carried out in accordance with those approved details so if they wanted to change them at a later date then they would need to apply to that condition to be varied we're requesting that the ground surfaces and the heat pumps and all the other plants have to be submitted so it's a catchall on all of the plant so if I can clarify what you're saying what you're saying is essentially by the wording of the condition permitted development rights for that removed so we haven't removed the permitted development rights but we have required that those details are submitted for all plant so if you wanted to change your plant then you would need to apply to vary either reapply or apply to vary the condition Charlotte did you want to come back on condition 8 please Yes 8.4 there was sorry a kind of typo incorrect Lee in there I'll just change I'll just show what I've just been changing changing so I believe the issue was it was because it had been put in there it said please include the wording that so just removing that so it should say control of dust, mud and debris in relationship to the functioning of the adopted public highway including repairs to the highway damage caused by psych vehicles the adopted public highway then the vicinity of the site will change that to shell also be swept within an agreed timeframe as and when reasonably requested by any officer of the local highway authority and that any highway damage including versions will be repaired in a timely manner at no expense to the local highway authority so I'll just sorry just for clarity just change that to shell so I hope that makes sense and overcomes the concerns about the wording that the parish councillor raised there thank you I wondered if Tam Parry can comment on the parking conditions please yes thank you the way I envisioned it working was that the feedback mechanism would essentially be that if there was observed vehicles parking outside of the site on the high street or elsewhere in the village that road would get back to the management of the site they would have a road with the tenants to try and ascertain whether any of the vehicles were theirs their employees if it was found to be that that was the case then we've already heard about the feedback mechanism through the tenancy agreements but I was not aware of that I was seeking some funding to enable to put in some yellow lines on the highway should that be necessary particularly concerned if any vehicles sometimes people's park on junctions or on corners and places where you don't want vehicles to park because they could be resulting in a highway safety issue so that's why I asked for £10,000 to address that mitigate that concern at the same time I thought that £10,000 could be used for any traffic calming in the village that was deemed by the parish council so the idea is that we would receive that funding prior to occupation and the county council would hold that funding unless it was requested by the parish council for it to be used and then we would be happy to pass it over thank you very much sorry the catabog chair, I come with trivedation because I realised that I've had my go but the things which have been said by the county council representative are good but they are not in the permission of which you are being recommended to give today and the suggestion that double yellow lines are put down, this is inimical in the village and it will just irritate the residents who are there at Mones and Park without a problem the problem is coming from here the applicant has explained to you that there is a mechanism which might solve the problem on site which apparently has been earlier rejected I don't know where that comes or if it is good enough to solve it but the double yellow lines point was put forward to us with a last resort if everything else fails can I just say one other thing I'll drop it because it slipped my mind now I'll leave you with that, thank you very much Rebecca Smith I can change my name if you like just if members are concerned given what they've heard from the county council transport assessment consultant that the condition isn't strong enough then we can include a line in or you could ask to include a line into the condition about similar to that in condition 18 part 4 H which is inclusion of a feedback mechanism if members were concerned that the condition wasn't strong enough then we could include a line into the travel plan requiring those details to be submitted thank you very much now I'm we'll now move on to the debate but I'm planning now to have a 5 minute break before a comfort break and then we'll come back no, come back at quarter past thank you very much indeed ok, now we've come to the debate have you got any who would like to start the debate Councillor Heather Williams I did feel that there was a pressure as you were both staring at me at that point so I started off so it is a troublesome one for me if I'm honest I think what's been proposed there the type of development being proposed there is suitable and also we know that our local economy supports needs more lab space and also from a mental point of view I do like the idea planning policy support setting up places like this in villages to help replace employment that once upon a time the farm was the centre of the employment for a village those times are changing and I think employment where people live is an important process so I'm going to say it's rather than difficult it's frustrating this because in so many ways it represents positive but I think we've heard that from local residents and the parish council as well that there is recognised need for this and the principle of it is not something that I disagree with I think there is real valid concerns around the parking issue and my concern is how how the applicant will be able to respond if there isn't the effect on the measures they're taking place that actually works and I'm very conscious that when I sat on the assembly I think for the Greater Harris Park Ship once it was discussed about a shuttle bus that was provided for and Andy Williams said how many people do you think used it and the response was none or sort of one or two so I think that the sentiments there and that's great but we all know the reality and the practicalities can be very difficult and the villages aren't somewhere that has the most amount of sustainable transport options so I don't have a problem with the principle I think actually it's the right scale as well but we have to acknowledge from the report that there is that sort of parking shortfall I'd be happy if the decked parking actually was still in because I can see that the site restraints are difficult because there's only so much space so I'm disappointed actually that that's been removed but we have to judge it on how it is at the moment I think if we are to support it then the strengthening of the conditions that have been asked for in relation to parking I would really welcome and I'm happy to hear back from officers suggestions around how that could be resolved particularly about the loop back because I'm very concerned that we will monitor it but what can we do at the end of that I do understand that the gym and the cafe are and I think actually it's positive that it's open to the public because we've seen in other applications where that becomes a friction with the local community but equally it's something that potentially adds to the parking problems so I'm particularly frustrated as it currently stands it just feels like there's one more box that should be ticked and that's the parking and I'm not quite sure for me the balance enough it does feel like a risk for the local residents so I'm trying to balance whether I think that risk is mitigated enough so happy to hear from others I hope that's open the debate for you chair that you wrote after Thank you very much Councillor Sanford Thank you chair Unsurprisingly I'm also going to harp on the parking issue I look at paragraph 8.78 36 of our papers and the applicant is assuming 70% of employees will be at work on a typical day if the intention is to lease these buildings to life sciences companies we've heard from others that they want their staff pretty much onsite all day every day to use a laboratory space so this 70% figure suggests a possibly a bigger shortfall excuse me shortfall in parking we've already identified I also have concerns about the feedback mechanism I have visions of someone in the village complaining about parked cars which is fed back to the leasers and they send their enforcement people down it turns out to be neighbours cars a massive argument in the village for no particular reasons it seems very unpractical to me Like Councillor Heather Williams I probably would have preferred to see a two-deck parking ramp to actually accommodate all the possible cars that would use the site everything else the application has merit but I think the applicant should go away and rethink the parking proposals thank you Councillor Fein thank you chair I'm interested the parish council in their comments and Mrs Brock too said that they opposed it with regret I think there's a lot of support for the principle of this application as the Walsburn Councillor Heather Williams earlier on and I support principle two I thought that Mr Levy dealt very effectively with all the concerns and set out a little bit the vision and I was very glad that we had the opportunity to hear from him on this today the panel when they looked at this said this could be an exemplary development and I think that is the that is the case there are clearly some issues that remain to be resolved as far as the conservation areas concerned our conservation officers said it would not cause harm 844 similar to neighbouring properties 8101 and all the properties were considered as we heard earlier from officers so we come back to the parking and to the travel plan on the parking that was considered in the pre-apps and by the panel the question of a two story car park personally and I have difficulty grounding this in planning regulations I think that that would have been a white elephant in a few years time we are all concentrating on ways of reducing reliance on private cars to get to work this site has over 150 car parking spaces and there is a lot of emphasis being placed on minibuses and provision of other alternative methods now the travel plan I think it must be accepted that as currently written the condition as currently written may not be sufficiently specific and I believe that there may be ways of amending that perhaps in the same way as condition 18 I think it is in relation to a biodiversity environment has been written and I think we should have confidence that our officers have picked up the concerns that were raised this morning in relation to that and those points can be dealt with and the conditions are still to be finalised and approved so having said all that I think this could be should be can be an exemplary development and it is the sort of thing that in my view we should be encouraging as councillor Heather Williams said creation of replacement employment within the villages and of course in terms of the general demand for lab space in this area not just in Cambridge itself but in the surrounding villages so I would be inclined to accept the officer of recommendation and vote to approve this councillor Beppeth I believe just an additional point about access to the location and it was mentioned about the shuttle minibus but it seemed to be like there would be one trip only from the park and ride and then the stations Whistford and Falmere so it becomes a bit if you're going to offer it maybe offer more journeys because if you train is late or whatever and you've got like only one or two options then you're slightly stranded so more people would rely on it if they knew they could rely on it if you see what I mean so you get your train and you have the shuttle bus to get you to your place of work so that might be a way of reducing the need or the likelihood of people saying well I will drive because that's the only reliable way of actually getting there so maybe increase the shuttle bus but I'm not quite sure how you can put that into a condition to make that happen Rebecca Smith can you answer If I can just draw members' attention to condition 26 which requires details of the minibus service which includes the hours of operation number of services and the days of services to be submitted and agreed in writing so that level of information is still requested to come from the applicant to us and they are listening and can take that on board because it seems like a good opportunity to move people's mindset towards something which is an alternative to using a private car and to make sure that it does actually work thank you Councillor Wilson Thank you My question is really about I know from past experience that the viability of a bus or minibus is not always clear if it's only being used once or twice in the morning or once or twice in the evening who employs the driver for the rest of the day and that's one of the things that I'm a bit uneasy about is whether it's possible to actually recruit a driver for just a few journeys to and from the site in the morning and evening I don't know whether that's an issue that we can including, I don't think it's a matter that we can deal with planning conditions What are your plans? I was just saying that the planning condition relates to the requirement and the provision of that minibus service and that's the kind of as far as we can go in terms of the planning considerations So if they weren't able to employ someone to run the minibus what impact would that have on the development as well? I think My personal comment would be it depends on what they pay them and they're not restricted in the same way as a public company might be but there we are What's the comment you would make? The only comment I think I can make is that they would need to submit the details of their travel plan and we would approve that and their travel plan would include that service If that then changed then they would need to apply to vary the approved travel plan Okay I would make a comment now that the Councillor Thank you, Jerry It was again about the minibus service so I was just wondering if we were talking about a possible feedback mechanism I just wonder if there's any scope for that in condition 26 to check that it is working as envisaged and whether changing route or changing times might be needed to ensure that it is working I can come back on that I did suggest and if members would like to take on board the suggestion for the amendment of condition 26 to include a similar wording to in condition 18 part 4, part H which includes a feedback and then amendment tinkering with mechanism and it's up to members if they want to vote on to include that suggested amendment but I would tinkering and change minor amendments to wording a condition as part of the delegated authority to officers to deal with after the decision has been made but that would be my suggestion something along that wording I'm going to make my comments first of all in terms of the parking issues we have a conflict here between concern about the amenity of the parking in the village and our objective to promote active travel and alternative means of transport to the site they are in a sense conflicting which is why I feel that it's important that we review how it's working in time but if we don't my personal view is if we don't maintain the encouragement to use other alternative means of transport which I see that we're trying to do here we will encourage further use of private car which we're trying to discourage in terms of the later date when they do look at the travel the minibus service I would comment that we have been told that the service that is provided by granted park is well used so it's obviously possible to devise a well used minibus service but they do as I understand go to the centre of Cambridge and they might want to consider that in the future date so and presumably you will learn from experience how that develops so but in general I'm hesitant about at this stage the same that there isn't enough parking it seems to me that with a travel plan we should be able to achieve a sustainable solution Chancellor William Heather Thank you chair Just a couple of things one of which I forgot about earlier so I'll start with that it was brought to attention there was conditions around construction hours but not from operational hours I'm just wondering if that's something that officers are reflecting on or I think would normally be appropriate to apply just wondering if that's something that's been raised as concerns about operational hours as well as construction the other thing because I think there is a uniformed support to the principle of this and what we've done previously where the travel management or a particular area is of concern to various councillors is that it's been approved but on the basis that that condition and the transport management plan travel management plan and parking plan in this case would come back to committee we've done that before and then because then there is the process obviously that residents would be able to comment one of the things that's been raised is about we haven't seen the plan yet so in a hope to try and find a compromise to make it through whether that's something I think that the majority of councillors would be agreeable Peter Fein traditionally doesn't agree with me on these things perhaps I don't know but Peter Samford might give me a seconder on it I just think in the interest of trying to bring everybody to a conclusion that everyone can be on board with and agree with that may be helpful chair Can we have some advice whether that's possible first of all for us to require somebody to come back to committee I believe it's been done in the past so yeah Do we have a seconder for the motion? Yeah, it's Samford Councillor Fein So I am speaking to the motion as now seconded chair and I oppose it I said earlier I think we can rely on officers to have heard the debate today we have this proposal before us and everyone will be aware paragraph 11 we are if it is sustainable development we should approve it as early as possible we should not delay developments in order to discuss minor details that can be resolved by other means so I am very reluctant to see us ask applicants to come back to us on a future occasion when we can and we should resolve it today Do we have any other speakers? If I can just come back on the hours of use conditions so as I alluded to the current site from my understanding from the 1995 permission has unrestricted hours of use it's technically the same use class as this site so that's why we haven't felt that we could restrict the current use when it's actually proposed use I should say when it's the same use class as the existing use and from my understanding of the 95 commission it has unrestricted hours of use there's restrictions on deliveries and we've included restrictions on noisy construction works but my understanding is there's no actual restrictions on the hours of use operation I should say Do we have any other comment? I just wanted to clarify that my attempt isn't to frustrate or delay things but we have had significant concerns in relation to travel plan and parking and what bring coming back to committee the difference is that it does give people the opportunity to settle those concerns but also for residents to have more involvement in that process and the parish council to potentially have more involvement in that process and I think that will be vital for everybody to be on board or whatever plan that comes forward does and actually it would be better to have people supporting the project which might hold up a week or so but in long term could resolve matters so that's my sort of reasoning why I think we should support having the condition be determined by committee and delivery in that I'm just thinking that they won't want deliveries unlimited if they're currently restricted I don't know of that that's a separate point to the travel plan I think really I'll keep to the motion Council Harvey Thank you chair I just want to speak in support of what Vice Chair Peter Fain said about because I feel that might be desirable in a way that the effect of I mean if we allowed ourselves to bring conditions back to the committee I feel it would really limit the bandwidth of the committee in terms of the number of applications that we could bring before the committee so I agree with Council Fain we should be able to make a decision on this and to extend you know that any details are outstanding they should be decided by officers We've had both points of view has anybody else got any comments quickly then I think we should go to a vote Just to clarify we are voting on the motion that's right regarding the travel plan Yes please Just to clarify in terms of the recommendation so the recommendations approve subject to the conditions which is set out in the report and if I've captured them all correctly it's amended wording to condition 8 part 4 which Charlotte shared on her screen amended wording to condition 10 to remove the typo I think we're just talking about the travel plan I think we can then go on to the other conditions afterwards So in terms of the travel plan which is condition 27 that was to include some wording similar to that included in condition 18 part 4, part 8 Now as I understand it is to bring the travel plan back to committee once it comes in that's what I understood the motion was Am I correct? Yes we can amend the condition with the substantive item the motion is that condition 27 not be delegated to officers it would return to committee Okay To a vote To clarify if you're voting for the motion you're voting that the travel plan come back to committee you're voting against the motion you're voting that it doesn't come back to committee We have two people who haven't voted Okay The motion is not carried We will not send you back to committee if the application has approved Chair Chair may I propose that we now move to a vote on the application? We also wanted to make some alterations to the other conditions so we I think we need to vote that this be delegated to members to the officers to deal with in accordance with the comments on the committee Are you Councillor Williams? Chair I think we need officers to outline the conditions and the alterations that are going to be made I wouldn't feel comfortable just saying anything that's come out in the debate I don't think that would be fair on officers we wouldn't have given them a steer then and I'm still not clear whether the delivery restriction would still hold or whether that's something that we would need to apply Okay I was a head of myself Charlotte if you can bring up your screen for condition 8 and then 10 please So if I've captured all the proposed amendments there was amendments to condition 8 which should be coming which I think members should be able to see on the screen which deleted some wording and amended some wording slightly in part 4 of condition 8 and then condition 10 which was on Charlotte's presentation which just deleted the words that she's highlighting there to get rid of the typo that was Shell Commence which was on twice condition 27 if I've understood it correctly to include thanks for scrolling Charlotte to include part 4 if you can oh yes she's copied it into part 4 from part 4 from condition 18 part H which relates to the inclusion of a feedback mechanism so the local planning authority and the local highways authority allowing for alteration methods management prescriptions should be monitoring that necessary and then on unclear and I could take steer from members if there was a request to change or add in wording to condition 28 about once the artwork has been installed as Charlotte's drafted there and maintained as such thereafter with regards to delivery I've had a quick flick and Charlotte can correct me if I'm wrong but I can't see that we have proposed or suggested a condition relating to hours of delivery I might have missed it and if not then I would suggest we include the same condition that we had last time hoping Charlotte's scrolling on the 1995 commission which I can advise members that that was deliveries of HDVs shall not be carried out on the site before 7am on weekdays and 7am on Saturdays nor after 7pm on weekdays and 1pm on Saturdays or any time on Sundays or bank holidays it's an option to add that condition as well Can we do anybody have any comments upon these can we take these changes by affirmation okay we'll be happy with that okay thank you very much now we come to the main now we come to the main the main motion and I think we can put it to the vote now so can we go to a vote on the application just to repeat if you're voting for the motion you're also voting to accept the recommendation and approve the application if you're voting against you're voting to reject the motion recommendation and refuse the application thank you very much we have two people still not voted thank you that's been approved unanimously thank you very much indeed okay we now move on to the next sorry we move on to application number six we have my vice chair council of fame is withdrawing from this consideration of this application so I'll need to have another vice chair to replace him I recommend I will propose council of harvey do I have a seconder can I get accept by affirmation council of harvey just for clarity because I'm wanting more breaks because a particular reason this time for certain councillors we will have the presentation by the officer to present the application and then we'll have another break and then we'll go on to deal with the comments of the directors and agents thank you very much indeed okay the application here is 23 02823 full my god the application is for a change of use of 0.91 hectares of agricultural land including a barn to drive through phlebotomy unit remodeled access vehicle circulation space parking infrastructure and the key issue is the principle development design and visual immunity by diversity and the hiring network the application has been called in by council of fein who is withdrawn from consideration the recommendation is to approve subject to conditions Michael Sexton is the presenting officer Michael could you have presented thank you chair morning members chairs have already introduced the description of the event so I don't propose to read that part just to start off to draw members' attention to a couple of updates there was an update report published on Monday which reflects the revised position of Great Shelf of Parish Council so that supersedes paragraphs 6.2 to 6.3 at the main officer report also members would have received an email from Sarah and the Cliffs at Cambridge past, present and future yes they are for noon which refers to the planning history of the wider Magog Court site that had several attachments including Magog Court planning history and photos CPPF's consultation response to the application which is covered in the main officer report and a copy of the statement that Cambridge past, present and future will be made into the committee just hopefully everyone has seen that to the public website so that is in the public domain so moving on to the main item the application is located at Magog Court outlined in red this is Babrum roundabout leading north west into Cambridge key constraints the map on the left effectively shows you that the site is contained entirely within the Cambridge green belt and there is a single listed building to the north of the site agricultural and commercial buildings and on the right hand side is just an aerial photograph to show you surrounding agricultural context of the site Magog Court to the north Babrum Park and Ride to the north and some residential properties along Hinson Way you can see to the south of the site so there is some relevant planning history to this application through a prior approval application granted in July 2022 for the erection of a steel portal frame agricultural building just to draw members' attention to paragraph 10.3 of the committee report which refers to the planning statement that was submitted in support of that application that set out the balms to be used for the general purpose agricultural store for harvest crops and all bales and when emptied for agricultural machinery these are the approved elevations that formed part of that 2022 application and permission showing a large agricultural barn Members who attended the committee site visit will have seen the structure as it currently stands on site which is illustrated in these two photographs that I took during my site initial site visit so you can see that the building is substantially complete apart from the wall treatments on the four sides of the building during the course of the application I was provided with further photographs from the agent when we queried use of the barn and members who attended the site visit would have seen machinery part in the barn as part of that site visit so moving on to the proposed site plan the barn itself is not moving works around the building includes increasing amounts of hard standing to provide the circulation space of vehicles entering the site and moving in and around the barn and a small area of staff to the west of the barn there is a proposed and secured by condition an additional footway marked here in the dark grey hashing and a crossing across Hinton way these are the proposed elevations of the barn with the walls added the notable difference really is the insertion of these doors on the side elevations which allow cars to pass through the barn I have later on got an image side by side but effectively the scale and general appearance of the building is unaltered this is the ground floor plan that shows how those vehicles will be able to move through the site and how the function will work internally with these cabins and staff that are used to carry out for the bottom requirements and this is just an elevation to show these modest cabins in external views so just a side-by-side illustration of what the prior approval barn approved plans were against the proposed plans for the bottom use no change in scale in terms of height, length, width et cetera and this is a side elevation to the building is 48 metres in length 80 metres in width has a ridge height of approximately 9.5 metres and an eaves height of 7 metres within the proposal there are a number of landscape enhancements that are incorporated in the scheme which contribute positively to the proposal and to the biodiversity net gain that will be achieved these include notably enhancements to the hedgerow on the southwestern boundary of the site and eastern boundary as well secured by conditions along with conditions for landscape management and maintenance as set out in the report so the key issues before members today as set out in the committee report are the principle of development noting that there is a prior approval consent here that has been implemented the fact that the application site is within the green belts and within paragraph 150 of the MPPF the reuse of the existing buildings providing they are substantial is appropriate development in the green belts design and visual efficiency as set out in the report this is obviously a building that is currently in place the general external appearance in that building is largely unaltered as a result of the proposed development and that links in sort of the landscape in fact in terms of local landscape and wider landscape the general agricultural form of the building is retained there is a biodiversity net gain as alluded to previously and highway network I'm sure will be a key part of the debate on what the application has been considered by the local hives authority and the transport assessment team at Cambridge council to be acceptable in both highway safety terms and in terms of the impact on the highway network there is a condition that restricts the hours of operation of the building and they will be operating outside of peak time therefore there is not considered to be an impact on the highway network and the Babrum road roundabout in particular and other matters that are set out in the committee report the consideration of the application needs officers to conclude a recommendation of approval subject to the planning conditions and informatives are set out in sections 11 and 12 of the committee report thank you chair okay how do we have the first of all the questions of the application of the office of these any questions of the clarification council Sam thank you chair Michael could you return to the site plan point out the exit entrance to the site please so the entrance of the site is using the existing access from his way into McGog court which is located further along this road to the north accessing this proposed site you would enter through that existing access which is unaltered right and then you'd be able to enter along this track which will allow cars to move in and out of the site freely thank you I've got a question I think it would be helpful because a lot of people have commented that it should be considered as a new building in the green belt if we had comments from the officer and perhaps from the legal officer to explain why it's been considered as a change of use thank you chair I think all I would do is direct members to the committee report section 10 planning assessment which provides a planning background paragraphs 10.1 through to paragraph 10.22 outline the case of why this is considered to be a building that can be considered a change of use as set out in the report and as you have seen on site and in the photographs the main structure of the building has been erected and the roof is in place there are foundations in place within the first part of that structure so in planning terms it is considered a building I have referenced a couple of appeal decisions and some case law in respect to other types of development that have been considered to be a building in planning terms I've also set out in the report the implementation of the use in paragraphs 10.60 to 10.8 and it is why I shared the additional photographs and alluded to the description of development from the prior approval that the use did include the storage of agricultural machinery and clearly at certain points in time the building has been used to store agricultural machinery so in planning terms that is why it is also considered as a change of use application as opposed to a new build Thank you very much I thought it needed a bit of a meeting Veneta Thank you chair through you so building regs act describes building means any permanent or temporary building but not any kind of structure or erection in the reference for building includes records part of a building and discussed it with Michael several weeks ago this building structure whichever we call it is deemed to be a building in planning terms furthermore a building safety act a structure that is not attached to any other structure is a building I am satisfied this is a building and the change of use Thank you Any further questions council Williams Thank you chair Equally to note it's nice to have you back Michael in coming to committee we missed you in strategic science definitely So I just wondered if you my understanding is obviously around the fact that there has to be a certain proximity to the hospital with the previous site Could you just give us an indication perhaps on a map or Google maps sort of where where that fits within this boundary because obviously we would hope that it's the best possible place for what it's seeking to deliver I can share Google maps with you to give you an indication of where we are in the wider context so you'll see Baben roundabout here where my cursor is circling and Adam Brits Hospital conveniently labelled by Google maps to the northwest of the site for reference as set out in the report this is an existing facility that needs to be relocated from currently operating out of Newmarket Road Park and Ride which is located by the north here as set out in the report there is an alternative sites assessment has been through a number of sites one of the criteria is being within two miles of Adam Brits Hospital clearly this does place it closer than the current facility but I'm not sure that's necessary something we've weighed in the planning balance we've assessed this site but yes the context favourite of the site in the go court here and the hospitals in the northwest I've got a question will site only be used for national health service blood tests or will it be used in private blood tests too it may be a bit bizarre but my wife is Polish I've spent time in Poland and I know that in Poland for instance there were a very large number of private blood tests it's been an obsession there and in view of the problems of the health service I just wondered where that might actually be an issue in terms of the amount of usage that you might have on the building so the proposal is for a blood testing unit and we have looking to restrict that under condition 17 of the commission and I suspect that question might be best placed to the applicant when they speak to clarify that thank you very much okay now we seem to have finished, oh sorry, council redrop thank you chair I just wondered is the size of this facility and the number of patients expects to be served the same as for the new market road part of my facility I'm just trying to get out whether there's an increase or not in the traffic of the network, thank you I don't have the details of the scale of the new market road part of my site so I can't compare with one of those but certainly the transport assessment that's been submitted is based on that use continuing in terms of scale and numbers and the number of vehicles you expect to be visiting the site at any one time is based on the existing facility my understanding is it's not expected that that facility will expand as a result of this relocation but again the applicant may be able to provide further clarification on that but certainly the transport statement and what we've assessed is based on simply moving the site and continuing that level of use thank you, a chair may I ask a second please the paper has mentioned cycling parking and that being covered I couldn't see any diagram of that or any condition about how that would look, I just wonder if there is any protection to make sure that that cycling parking is provided in a covered way, thank you through you chair the site plan shows an area of cycle parking outside the building next to the car parking I don't believe that's currently shown as covered but were members minded to support the application we can certainly add a condition to any permission to require details of covered cycle parking to come forward but it may be chosen that that is moved into the building I don't know but we can certainly have a condition to secure those details okay okay, sorry cancer of Harvey thank you chair in a similar vein I think one of the points raised by the parish council was that and I agree it's rather surprising that there's no mention of photovoltaics because you know it's one of the most common comments that I get when I'm sort of talking to residents of South Cambridge here that you know why I've got so much industrial building roof space are not occupied by photovoltaics and I know normally there are issues and problems around that because quite often the tenants are not the owners and there are problems with sort of coordinating the owner of the building with those occupied but I would have thought in this case given that I think the health use is being sort of used as part of the justification for this in that it provides a public benefit I would have thought that quick pro quo that is that we should at least be doing the best we can with that building at the stage that it's at and the opportunity it provides to provide some low carbon energy is there a question here well there is a question so we can include that in a condition a chair through you can I just remind members you are considering the application before you yes okay well thanks for that I'm really asking if that can if that could be okay well maybe I should retract that and save it for at least a point I can clarify if you'd like to we did talk I did speak with our Stainbury's office on this point because of the nature of the end use being a drive through facility and the internal arrangements having cabins it's not like this is changing to an office use so there's not that heavy energy demand so in this instance sort of cannot be considered appropriate for the end use of the building and the proposal that's before you but certainly I think in general terms you would encourage that and support that but it's the specific end use in this instance that we haven't that's why that hasn't been brought into this proposal have you any more questions comments Councillor Williams I was just going to invite Councillor Harvey to clarify something that he said because he mentioned the word quid pro quo which obviously is not something that happens in planning there is no bargaining or favouring as it said so I imagine that was a sort of an example of explaining about trying to get the better of the development and wasn't suggesting that there is quid pro quo in our planning service so I thought I'd give Councillor Harvey the chance to clarify that yes well thank you for the opportunity to clarify that and yes I probably should have chosen my words more carefully but really I over it's summarised and what I was really questioning was or really pointing out the point made by the parish council that there was no provision made for photovoltaics I'm just really wanting to flag that and thank you for the opportunity to clarify could I simply ask from a point of information should the applicant later desire to put on solar panels on the roof he would probably be able to do that with in permitted development rights I would have to check the regulations I know certainly there's no culture building but the rights are restricted so with the end user class I can look into that and come back but potentially under PD or through a planning application but I would have to okay think have we got just Councillor Williams okay just this and then we'll have a break for I come for a break thank you I was just going to suggest that to try and actually move us away from as important as we have had the advice that we have to judge the application as it is I'm sure that officers of the council in various departments can give advice as to how to to do that if they so wish but just trying to keep us back on back on track chair and thank you very much okay now I'll have a comfort breaker of 10 minutes to 20 past 12 and then we'll come back and deal with the other the comments of the other participants in consideration of this this application thank you very much just to note that we've had a representation by the both parish councils now and I've accepted that both parish councils can speak for the 3 minute period when it comes to that point first of all we have the objective Sarah Nicholas from Cambridge past present and future who is speaking online Sarah we have we have allowed 3 minutes for the presentation could you please keep your time to 3 minutes I will break in if you'll exceed it thank you very much thank you this application is an example of people using loop holes in the planning system to get development in locations where it wouldn't otherwise be allowed and be able to do this over and over again if we must decide to approve this application then there is a likelihood that we will see more applications on this site an erosion of the green belt this barn was allowed to be built through prior approval which provides a streamlined process by passing the need for a full planning application it allows development necessary for the purposes of farming it is not to allow buildings only to apply to change their use the recommendation to allow this development in the green belt is being justified on the grounds that agricultural use has commenced and that it is a substantial construction I do not consider that this is the case work on barn 4 commenced about a year ago and quickly got to the stage you see today it has stood empty for all that time despite there being one period of harvest in this time it has never been used to store grain it has only been in the last few weeks that we've seen a few pieces of agricultural equipment placed under the roof in an attempt to convince the council that the agricultural use has been implemented the second justification to allow this development is that the building is a substantial construction if by substantial we mean large in size value or importance then yes it's big but it's of little value or of importance because it can't be used for the purpose it was built for if we ask whether the building is substantially complete so that is fit for its intended purpose and the owner can carry sorry can occupy and use the property then no it is incomplete, it is missing its walls it is not weathertight and cannot be used for grain storage it is not sufficiently complete for the NHS to occupy or you utilise the building without significant works I therefore argue that the proposal does not comply with national green belt policy which allows the reuse of a building provided the building is a permanent and substantial construction the proposal is not reusing a building because the building has ever been used and is not a substantial construction because significant works are needed to make the building usable allowing this development will not preserve the openness of the green belt and therefore conflicts with the purposes of including the land within it even now with the barn just being a skeletal frame it blights views when approaching Cambridge and from the country parks of Macogdown and Wandelbury once completed and in operation and with 250 to 300 cars a day curing through the site it will totally change the rural character of the area I highlight the concerns of local residents of the significant increase of vehicular traffic and with the order of 35 cars an hour arriving and departing the site and the effect this will have on their residential immunity, rural landscape and highway safety the current site and new market road benefits from a non-residential location and not being in the green belt the sequential test should have prioritised these requirements we ask members to refuse this application on the grounds that it uses a building which was only allowed because it was for agricultural purposes it introduces a use incompatible with its location in the green belt and intrusive in the landscape, thank you thank you, do we have any questions for points of clarification from the speaker thank you very much I now call upon the agent the applicant Caryn Charlton with support from other people just to remind you we respect people to three minutes I'll call you to close if you reach three minutes thank you very much indeed look forward to hearing from you thank you chair and good afternoon to the committee my name is Caryn Charlton and I am from Cambridge University hospitals and I'm joined by my colleague Michael Henry from Navigate Planning I'd like to take the opportunity to thank the officer for the constructive pre-application discussions and also the well-weds report and of course we welcome the recommendation of approval the officer has clearly explained the process by which the recommendation has been reached and I don't propose to reiterate the case the building as members have seen exists and will continue to exist regardless of the decision taken today the proposal is for the change of use of the building to provide vital phlebotomy services of blood sampling services to support the region's healthcare system the off-hospital location allows an increase in the clinical capacity of the hospital making best use of the available space for healthcare the off-site nature of the proposal was started during the pandemic to improve access for our patients and to ensure that patients can continue to have vital blood sampling services during the pandemic and also freed up some space in the hospital setting that was already quite cramped and it has been quite a success with many more patients having blood samples taken than pre-pandemic the existing facility has to move from Newmarket Road Park and Ride and that was a concession at the time during the pandemic when that was set up and you if you know of this site you'll know that that is made up of tanks and some cabins and we have had this extended on two occasions but as people are coming back to Cambridge and there's a need for Park and Ride services there is a need for us to move the service and also find a permanent location for the service for our patients and also for our staff and the service there the clinical teams are very clear of the benefits of the drive-thru facility we have during the pandemic looked at a number of other options as well in housing in the new development even city centre locations but the drive-thru clinical model is really beneficial so rather than us having to lift and shift the phlebotomy service and having a nomadic service we need to find a permanent solution and so following the sequential test that we've looked at both on-site and off-site this site was chosen and considered the preferred location Pre-application discussions were undertaken with the offices and the application is made and while it was acknowledged there's some local objections the proposal operates outside of the call traffic hours peak hours and we intend to close the Babrum Park and Ride and the Babrum Road roundabout and it is supported by the county highways this also then represents a wider public health benefit and is considered by officers to be appropriate development in the green belt as part of the application additional pedestrian footpaths and crossings are proposed along with further landscape planting to increase the accessibility so I just want to thank the officer and reiterate the officer's recommendation and I thank the committee for your time Thank you Do we have any questions or a point of clarification from the developer and the councillor of Edward I'd just be grateful for some clarification on the benefits of drive-through service piece I guess we're kind of trying to produce car use so it'll just be useful to see why you think a drive-through service is the right way to go Thank you Our clinical colleagues who deliver this service day in day out are very clear of the benefit of this it allows for for patients to just drive through have their samples taken and drive right out so it also reduces the need for trips to the hospital coming to the hospital finding their way into the hospital and what we've done here is try to also accommodate those patients who might need might need additional support by having some of that support accommodation if they need to be brought into a treatment facility to have their blood taken so try to really think of both of those patient cohorts but the main aspect as we've seen very successfully is through the drive-through and being able to increase the throughput Cancel a bit Could you just clarify Sorry Could you clarify a little more why you wouldn't want to move to a nomadic service It might be obvious but I'd like to hear it from you Thank you Thank you for a very good question If any of the members have seen the facility you'll know that there is made up of temporary tents if you like there's some cabins in there that we've put in over time to improve the environment working for staff during the adverse weather we have to close the service if there's high winds we have to close the service impacting up to 300 patients a day which then impact on their treatment journey and also their diagnostic journey so the cost incurred in that the lifting and shifting and maintaining that is quite significant for the healthcare service so what we are proposing is making an investment in setting this service up in the drive-through to ensure that we've got appropriate weather protection and adequate environment for staff to work in because without staff we can't operate the service and most importantly is the continuity of service because if we have to shut the service down to relocate it we have to shut it down for the period of breaking it all down then moving it then reinstating it so it's the continuity of the patient service that's really quite key councillor Wilson thank you I have used the new market road Parkamide service and it was very quick I was a cue of one as the person who dealt with me announced very happily but I do know from local chatter that sometimes people have to wait an hour or more so I'm just wise about cars queuing for an hour and what provisions there would be in place to make sure that the throughput is very quick and there aren't cars idling and people waiting for an hour and whether there's provision sufficient provision for if there is a build-up of cars in the space thank you very much I think one of the key things is in setting up a permanent facility we have got a greater opportunity to streamline the pathway and also by utilising pre-booking is certainly something that we can have a look at and I'm sure the clinical service will be very keen to ensure that that the throughput is such because nobody wants to have our patients wait and the worst thing would be is patients wait a long way they decide to go away and have to come back again so it's in all of our interest to ensure that the throughput is as expected I have a question that I was referring to earlier on will you be only dealing with NHS patients or will you also be dealing with private patients as well as I explained that you may have heard I'm experiencing that in other countries you do have quite a lot of private patients it's quite frequent and I'm worried that considering the positioning of the health service now people may be encouraged to do so and it might increase. I just wonder what the position is thank you very much chair and thank you for reminding me of that particular question this is predominantly an NHS facility so you can't just decide you have a blood test referral you turn up and you have your blood taken so it will be referral through GP or through the hospital so that's predominantly NHS service. Thank you. Thank you for letting me go again I just remembered that Mr Sexton advised I asked my question to the applicant and that was about whether the size of the vicinity and number of patients expected to be served at this new proposed vicinity would be similar to 100 Park and Ride facilities Thank you councillor Yes the proposed throughput is around the same about 300 patients a day I think what we will benefit from is a better aligned site and therefore we can be more efficient in the layout but we have seen an increase pre-pandemic and so we are looking to maintain that around 300 a day I would also like to ask there's reference to the number of public transport access and it's only through the bus to Haberhill which is half hourly maybe in your existing facility do you have many people using public transport what sort of proportion might come by public transport and do you consider that for instance the Abraham Road Park and Ride might be near enough for people to come there and walk or in particular in a blood test they may know what their health might be Can you just ask my colleague my colleague to take that Thank you chair So currently at the new market park and ride site there's not the provision for people to walk through the drive-through facility but that's something that we're looking to incorporate as part of this proposal and also as part of that there's provision for motorcyclists and cycle parking on site so they can by bicycle or motorcycle or by the park and ride and then walk across to the facility and still have their blood tape Thank you, do we have any other questions Thank you very much indeed Now I move to the parish councils First of all can we have Mr Greg Price from Great Shelter Parish Council who will be speaking on online Just to remind you we limit you to three minutes and we'll break I'll stop you if you exceed the three minutes Thank you very much indeed Thank you chairman Have you had approval of your council Yes, I can just confirm that I have the consent of the parish council and I am chair of the council planning committee I'd also like to declare an interest in that I am an individual who would make service or make use of lobotomy on a regular basis and I should also declare that I work for a health care provider and that will influence some of the comments We initially supported this proposal but having reviewed that we now object and we have a number of grounds the first of these is traffic this facility will significantly increase about 25 to 30% increase in vehicle movements within the vicinity of the development which gives increasing concern for road safety of all users of the highway but would also have a detrimental effect on the environment We are aware that there are often significant delays at the current facility with people waiting up to 90 minutes and as this is a drive through only service then stop start nature of queuing traffic would increase the amount of pollution in this area and that's on top of the pollution that will come with the increase in traffic and we note that the figures within the initial application were worked around the 180 pass-throughs per day and we're looking at 300 plus for this development Although the facility is proposed to close at 4.30pm traffic will still be moving at a time when there is already an increase in traffic in part due to school collections both locally and from the city shift change at the hospital and those who are looking to beat the rush hour Access to the site is on a corner of a roundabout from a major A road which is an arterial route into Cambridge We have assumed that the majority of users will be coming from this road the A1307 and that they will want to return this way meaning that they will have to negotiate the oncoming traffic However it is inevitable that there will also be a significant increase in the traffic along Hinton Way as people from the west of the city and the region access it otherwise they would have to come a very long circuitous route Hinton Way speed limit has been changed to 30mph but there are significant numbers of reports of speeding and it's felt this access is not suitable for the number of anticipated vehicles to the site We understand that the government has set out five purposes for the green belt one of the setting and special characteristic of historic towns another to safeguard the countryside from encroachment With this in mind the parish council created a position and statement on the green belt which can be found on our website We cannot see any good reason why the green belt is being chosen for this development No analysis has been provided and with this in mind we feel that if there is a requirement for a phlebotomy unit and we would not argue that there isn't the land Would you please swap up please Sorry, that there are alternatives including on the biomedical campus itself and if I could just make one other point this is a drive through facility there is nothing in the plans to show access by cyclists and pedestrians other than by staff and we are of the view that this is contrary to the trust's legal obligations under the public sector equality duties and under their carbon obligations in service condition 18 Thank you very much Have we any questions for points of clarification from the parish councillor Councillor Williams Thank you Probably not for the speaker We have just been told about obligations being contrary to looking for legal advice Is that something that we can take into consideration in the planning process or not Sorry, through you chair Do you mean the legal obligations to the trust? I would have to consider that That's not something I can do I don't believe we can but the trust's legal obligations is not found by the trust's legal obligations This committee is bound by the limits of planning not obligations of the NHS trust Have we any other queries points of clarification Thank you very much I now call on Councillor Barbara Cettle from Stakeford for the parish council Can I ask if you've got the approval of your councillor to speak for them? Yes, I have approval of the parish council I have responsibility for planning matters on Stakeford at the parish council Just to remind you, you have three minutes I'll stop you if you exceed that Thank you very much I'd like to reinforce a couple of points that have been made, one by Sarah the previous speaker in terms of the use of that building As she stated a piece of machinery has been put in it in the last few weeks simply for photographic purposes Prior to that building had stood totally empty for the whole time it's been in situ The other thing is that this is planning by stealth This is the third barn at least that has been put onto this site with the grounds that it was needed for agricultural purposes never been used for agricultural purposes and has become an NHS subsidiary building The previous one is the one next to it which is well hidden from view which is one good thing and was used for Covid testing and during the time that that does it as it's peak there were queues all the way round the Baberham Road roundabout and down Hinton Way traffic was at a stand still the engines were all running the environmental impact of such traffic is appalling in what is a green belt site The site is proposed as a drive-through facility there's been comments made that you can actually access it from the Baberham Road Park and Ride that is not possible as we will all know the A1307 is subject to major activity at the moment to try and make it a usable road which has no congestion and there is no public footpath there is no way to cross the 1307 as a pedestrian cyclist for that matter from the Baberham Road Park and Ride you cannot get to this site so from that angle it also says that this is permitted use well it's not permitted use because it doesn't comply with any of your green belt policies it is not to be used for the community in terms of any sort of gym or public facility whatever this is an NHS business that is being put in there when the permission was given originally it was to be that the barns would never be on view and as you've seen from the pictures this is just blatantly not true it is an absolute eyesore on the landscape especially if you're looking towards the Gognacog Hills the whole thing is just all you can see is this great big shell of a barn and to finish with this we really do not see how it can be passed through as an acceptable change of use when it's never been used for anything at all whatever the officers seem to think you're being duped and you're having the wall pulled over your eyes thank you very much thank you do we have any points of clarification thank you very much councillor Cattle now we have a local member councillor Peter Fane who will give his opinion Peter I don't think I need to outline the conditions thank you very much problem with your microphone Peter thank you chair I don't intend to take the three minutes I think it's important for the members of the committee to just consider the full planning history of this site and the previous use of permitted development rights for agriculture in 2011 now converted in 2014 2016 and of course 2022 there is a consistent history on this site one of the buildings as was mentioned earlier the rather similar building slightly smaller next door has been used for drive through tests in the past and was mentioned that did create a few problems but is on the same site next door on the site I'm not quite sure whether that was apparent in the sequential test in November 22 now I think it's already been made clear the question of the planning status this building it is without doubt a building the question is whether it is a building with planning status because if the permitted development right has not been met that is the building has never been used for agriculture which I think we can establish then that puts in a different category the case was strongly made for the need for grain storage it was proven at an earlier stage or accepted by the council that there was a need for up to 2500 cubic metres of grain four different crops to be stored on this site and that this building was necessary for that purpose I have seen nothing to suggest that if that was true then it is not true now and therefore it is reasonable to expect that there may be further applications for permitted development rights on this site in due course and I would confirm from my knowledge that there was no machine restored in that site before harvest that is at the time this application was submitted the conditions of planning permitted development right had not been implemented so my recommendation to the committee would be to refuse this application that is effectively to defer it to invite the applicants to come back with a fresh application which can be considered as a new application in the green belt which is the way this ought to be considered because ultimately if the permitted development rights which we use to secure this building are not complied with then it is perfectly possible the prefabricated building of this nature to remove it from the site in the buildings in the past in that case it would then be possible to consider the very considerable landscape effects of this building which were not submitted as part of the consideration for the permitted development right application earlier and it would indeed be possible on the new application if the developers wished to if the developers wished to to even consider the vice chair's suggestion of the federal take panels as well but that would be a separate matter thank you chair Do we have any points of clarification from Councillor Ffain? Councillor Williams Thank you chair and Councillor Ffain you'll appreciate the balance of where we need to strike today but could I just be clear as to what your request is of committee is it because I heard the word refuse and defer both mentioned so could I just clarify what it is that you're asking committee to do and if it was a refusal is there particular policy or something that you have in mind for our grounds to do so? My recommendation is that this be considered on another occasion as a new application and not as a conversion of a building which has already been used because the committee has heard evidence that it has not been used for the purposes for which secured permitted development rights Do you have other points of clarification? Thank you Peter Now I think now we're coming to the debate who would like to open the debate? Councillor Williams I think I might start with some further clarification from officers if that's okay with you chair just based on what we've heard I think it's necessary Thank you and then I might come back for the debate that's okay when I've had time to consider that I think for us as Councillor Fane's just referenced that we are clear that the legal position of the building is that it is a building but this usage the fact that we don't have evidence of it having actually been used for its initial purpose what in a planning sense can we give balance or weight to from that I think that would be really helpful for us to have advice from officers because that does seem to be the crux of the issue not to minimising the other things that have been raised but does seem to be the balancing point Thank you chair and through you This was a point of discussion that we've had questions on and I think as set out in paragraphs 10.6 to 10.8 of the report we were keen to establish that use had commenced because as you see in my site photos when I attended the site the building was empty it is an active farm site and there is photographic evidence of machinery being parked in the barn and that's alluded to in the report the original prior approval application was for the storage of grain and when empty the storage of agricultural machinery so there is evidence that agricultural machinery has been parked in the barn therefore that use has been implemented in planning terms and it was there when we visited the site for a planning committee site visited members of the scene parked agricultural machinery there so I think in legal terms we would be satisfied that that use has been implemented Have we any other points on debate? Councillor Medrup? Yes sorry it's a little bit repetitive with Councillor Williams but it's just from my mind so what we're saying legally is that there is no minimum length of time of use before a change of use can come into practice is that correct? Through you chair Commencement has taken place in fact that there is machinery in that barn now any farm building so I speak generally or any provision it would only take one day to implement it the fact that the machinery is in there is implementation that may not be palatable but that's it it's rather like Commencement of Development you just need to stick a spade in the ground Councillor Hull Yes thank you chair first is it legally significant that as I think Councillor Fane mentioned or would it be significant if that agricultural use had not happened before the application was submitted or is that irrelevant? I don't think it is irrelevant but the evidence that the officer gathered was that when he undertook his site visit that machinery was there Was that visit before or after the application was made? I'll pass that question over to the planning So I visited the site during the course of the application and the machinery wasn't part there at the time of my site visit I think I tried to make that quite clear in the presentation however this structure mentioned in third party comments was constructed some time ago and we don't have the benefit of 24 hour CCTV about when or when not the first use or parking of agricultural machinery commenced I don't think that was monitored 24-7 by the local community fully appreciate that when driving past it may not have been evident that there wasn't machinery there so yes, a challenging question to answer in full but certainly in terms of deterring the application that use has commenced But it draws the point that you couldn't have only seen it once after the application has been made because you would only be considering the application the legal point is we were asking was if it hadn't been started before the application was made is that relevant to our consideration how about the legal advice on that We have no way of knowing we have the applicant saying it was commenced we don't have any benefit something Michael and I did discuss we looked at Google Earth we took as much we looked as much as we could when Michael undertook his site visit the agricultural machinery was in there but it wasn't since the application was validated and now we've seen that evidence but the officer can only go on what the applicant says we don't have any other information to go on I'm sorry I thought Councillor Sanford was first I'm sorry but Councillor Thank you chair can I just step back and look at the big picture we've been asked to approve a drive-through facility at a time when the council is trying to encourage people to use active travel yes I understand there's a facility at Newmarket Road Park and Ride site that needs to be closed but are we actually following our own policies by moving it down to a rural area and potentially causing traffic chaos and pollution in the Shelfords and Stapleford as we've heard I can't help thinking that the NHS with a little will could probably find a little corner of the Avonburg site to build a permanent facility where the patients could arrive by the frequent bus service and maybe in a couple of years even by training let's face it which organisation has to deal with respiratory diseases and the other conditions brought on by pollution it's the National Health Service so I would have thought it was in their own interest to look for an alternative to a drive-through service Thank you chair Councillor Riffith My point was very similar that I just think this is the wrong site and also the wrong sort of emphasis on just the the prospects a real prospect if something doesn't go exactly to time have there been a slight delay and then you've got a cure of traffic I'm sorry the point has been made I won't be voting for this Councillor Williams Okay and I think it could be very easy for us to go outside the planning sphere on this application there's lots of things coming in so I'm going to do my best chair to forgive me if I don't touch on everything I'm going to try and bring it down to the planning elements so one of the planning elements we've been asked to consider is it was suggested sort of planning by stealth and we've been given all the different applications on the site and a loophole now I think many of us on this committee share the frustration of people in general using and exploiting loopholes but they are loopholes and by definition we can't refuse on that on those areas so share the frustration but I think we wouldn't survive at appeal if we were to do that so that sort of discounts that element then we have whether it is a building or not a building I think everyone's agreed it is a building I never thought I'd be using that phrase but I think in this circumstance it is correct and then we have the use I understand the questioning around when that happened but I and I share the dissatisfaction that there isn't a minimum requirement as Councillor Redhurst and Parish Councillor said it's not for a long period I equally share the frustration because it makes communities quite hostile to when agricultural building students makes people sceptic of that and actually there is a need for more grain storage and everything that they have been given permission for so lets the whole side down as it were when this happens but I think the timing of the occupation is something that really would be material because if that was the case we now know that it has started so simply a completely identical application could happen and they said there's the evidence to happen before do you see what I mean to the timing it's frustrating but I think it wouldn't change the end result so we're kind of stuck I think with the principle of when it comes to drive through facility off campus and we look at the need I think there is an identified need yes we need to support people going through other methods other forms of transport but ultimately there is still a lot of people that are car dependent and equally I think back to when I was having daily scans and every other day blood tests when I was pregnant and at the start of my pregnancy I was having my immune system suppressed so coming into contact on public transport was a no no and there will be people that require regular blood testing that will have those same risks so I don't think there will ever not be a situation where a personal vehicle would be required you just hope that the volume reduces so I think there is a need for it what I think is potentially up for us to debate is whether there is additional substantial harm created in the traffic movements and I think and we have on there the key issue of the highway network 300 people are going to shout at me I think if I've got that number on but what I heard was 300 a day and between half nine and half four that's seven operating hours and there's going to be peaks people are going to go at lunchtime most likely or pick up just before that is like 47 48 an hour that is quite a high volume from reading through the report will definitely correct me if I'm wrong there isn't a capacity restriction on the application I'm waiting for a Can I jump into this point because we have obviously heard the debate from all parties and if if plan permission were to be granted I think we could consider including a planning condition to require an operational management plan to secure how many appointments would be made available per hour pedestrian cycle access arrangements so I think some of those the transport council have advised that there's no highway safety and highway network issues arising from this but I think we could further refine the use of the building through an operational management plan condition so that might help alleviate some concerns at that point right so if I can continue continue chair I'll forgive the very useful comments because I think the highway network but I was just going to say we have an issue that we don't have a statutory objection and for those that aren't familiar and most people are we know that again when things go to appeal it's very difficult to use that in order to common local knowledge it's frustrated in particular flooding and traffic we just know doesn't get given the same weight as a statutory consultees so while I might take issue with their response that is what we're dealing with I do like the sound of the operational your words whatever it was there Michael operational management plan I do think that would settle potentially a lot of concerns so long as the local community gets to properly get involved and is consulted on that so my view is that yes loop holes are being used but we can't do anything about it other than try to you know have that change at a different level I think there is a need for it I think the location in its proximity to Adam Brooks to be able to get we know it needs to be even a certain distance it probably is an ideal from a logistics point of view but equally I don't want to see an adverse impact on the residents and I just want so it's I'm frustrated for the second time today but I do think there is a need for it whether it's the right place but I'm just looking and I'm thinking what could we defendably object on so it's not that I don't want to object but what can we defendably object on and I think it's very very difficult in this case thank you very much Ilyw Cantillaw Wills thank you I'm finding this one very very difficult and I still haven't made up my mind I recognise the there is a reference back to Covid testing and the and the what that calls to local residents but I think those were exceptional times and then we have to move on from that and I understand how it is easier for people to go to one of these drive-through sites rather than navigating parking at Adam Brooks which I always find really difficult I have as I said benefited from attending one of these sites but I'm very uneasy about the what we've been hearing about the use of this site up to now and the question mark over I know that because I understand that because machinery has been placed there that it has become an agricultural site but I'm very uneasy at the evidence we've heard the allegations that that was just put there for a particular reason so I'm finding this very difficult and also my final point is that I don't think I've heard enough about why the alternative sites weren't suitable so I would have liked to have known more about that because this does seem to be a very rural site and and I'm concerned about the impact on that site if this if this site is created for a drive-through for about me lost the word but anyway those are my thank you very much I'm sorry can I just come in there's certainly evidence that this process of building an agricultural building conversion has taken place several times I just wanted to point there's obviously concern that this will be repeated I assume you're joining agricultural landers in the same ownership would it be possible to withdraw permitted development rights for future states in the application or is this not a whole article four direction process just out of interest so we can only consider the land that is within the red line boundary of the application within permitted development rights there are certain rules around how much floor space you can create I think it's a two year limit on how much you can create under PD for a new agricultural building but it's outside of the control of this application to remove PD for the remaining farmland so if we wanted to do it we would have to think about separately on the issue of whether we would want to do an agricultural direction thank you very much that's useful knowledge sorry councillor Wilson you've had councillor Harlan yes thank you chair well I my I think as a number of councillors said particularly councillor Heather Williams I mean the problem is it seems to me in constructing a reason to refuse because as you've already said councillor Williams I mean it does seem that there's a loophole but I thought you know the question of whether or not use was established before the application which I previously raised to the officer I mean I think you made a very good point actually even if that were the case and that were legally compelling one could still bring a new application and then that would be satisfied so it seems to me to sort of nullify that route for projecting so I worry that where we could reject this would just be overturned on appeal so I think I would rather with gritty teeth I would be councillor Williams okay sorry if I could just come back on that element if councillors were concerned that the use hadn't commenced as such before the application was submitted from committee site visit we could clearly see that there was machinery stored there so I guess what I'm suggesting is if we were concerned about that the applicant there would actually be nothing to stop the applicant from withdrawing the application and putting it straight back in again because now we can sit you know we've been there we've seen the use we've seen the parking on site so yes we couldn't prove that it we couldn't prove that it hadn't commenced when the application had submitted because as Michael said we unfortunately can't look at every every site in the district 24-7 but the applicant provided some evidence and then we've seen it during the life of the application but in terms of whether it commenced before the application was submitted we can't prove it hadn't councillor Williams just something just to be clear myself my thoughts on this with the proposed condition about an operation management plan trying to get the right three words the right order there can tell it's nearly lunch a do my rational around that is that if we were to refuse which I think in an ideal world a lot of us would want to do but it could then go to appeal and be given permission in its current form because we know that our reasons for refusal would be weak so if we grant permission but add to this condition that at least we're giving the local community a chance to have some sort of input and to control what happens there and I just so my mind is thinking that way round to try and get some improvement for residents because I agree what's currently there with the current uncontrolled parameters is not something I think any of us are comfortable with Are you making a proposal I definitely think before we take a vote we should have a vote on whether we include that condition or not definitely yet Thank you, you're proposing this Do we have a seconder? Can I second and also speak to it? Yes certainly, can we hear you? Is that okay? Thank you for being a little bit more calm-headed than I was a little bit earlier and for coming up with that suggestion because obviously I can see that this is a facility that is needed but my concerns I think that might help with getting around the concerns about the highway network being logistically great for getting the blood back to Adam Brooks but also the other side of that being it could get clogged up with with cars so that what was the three words operational management plan might be a more a secure way of making this work for everybody so I am happy to second Does anybody else wish to speak to this? Can we Can I Can we do this by affirmation? Is everybody happy? Okay Did you wish to speak? Just before we went to a vote I wanted to ask about a condition for covered cycle parking as well and if other councillors were in agreement with that because it would align with our local plan policy TI3 which says cycle parking should be covered and then a convenience secure location Just for clarification I've just put up on screen what those draft conditions might look like The cycle parking is one of our standard conditions The operational management plan condition I've kind of been crafting as the debate has gone on but we can take that away and agree final wording if that was something members wanted to see added Yeah Okay So now I want to make a little comment on it most of the comments have probably been made This is Chair, we just need to agree the motion by Councillor Redden first Do we have a seconder? Councillor Redden Can we take that by affirmation? Now I wanted to comment This is as people have commented a loophole. It's clearly being used It's unsatisfactory but we are where we are The need for the the desire of the applicant for the bottom unit is clear and I can see the advantages of the site is closely it's a main road from the point of view of driving to it is probably as good what sites you're going to get you're not going to have to drive between the site and Adam Brooks through urban areas it's generally a rural area so I can see from their point of view the suitability I'm also thinking in terms of people having blood tests often it's because of anemia they're not the sort of people who want to go on public transport you often want to be driven to the site and therefore that's quite appropriate so I see the arguments in favour were this already an industrial site I can see very much I can see why that might be chosen but it's an agricultural building which the plot plays in the convert we have to consider an agricultural building I think it's unsatisfactory I think we do need to think about how we might prevent future recurrence and that's something that we need to think about in the future whether there are possible ways forward but I find it difficult as people have commented to find a defendable reason for refuse and I sincerely don't want further encouragement on the green belt I feel that's not something we want to encourage so it's a difficult situation where we're basically lumbered and I don't see that in my person I can't see how we can do anything other than approve it but we do need to consider considering applications in future how we might tackle this problem ok now I think we can probably go to a vote can we no we can't do it I inquired about it and we can't do it within the application there are other possible actions we can take but it's not part of the application thank you for clarifying if you're voting for if you're voting for you're voting to approve the application as per the offers recommendation if you're voting against you're voting to refuse the application counter to the officer's recommendation thank you very much it's going to say as amended with the two additional conditions one relating to an operational management plan and one relating to covered cycle parking I confirm it, it's as amended ok thank you very much ok the application has been improved now going to stop for lunch almost perfect timing this is what I plan to stop for lunch in any case we will come back to thank you very much indeed you are now welcome back to the planning committee we now consider item 7 great abington the item number 20 application number 23 stroke 0317 for stroke H4 H6 High Street at Great Abington enlargement of a previously permitted photo deck of our attack array on the barn route key issues are the impact on the designated heritage asset impact on the character and appearance of the area and sustainability the application has been called in by councillor hevin brachler the recommendation is to refuse Tom Chennery is the presenting officer Tom could you please present thank you chair, I'll just share my screen so I was just waiting for it to catch up thank you chair so the application before members today as you said chair at H6 High Street Great Abington so it's the enlargement of previously permitted photo deck array on a barn route and officers are recommending for refusal so there is a slight update and that's just that we received a letter from local councillors Henry and John bachelor just outlining their stance on the application it was very similar details that were considered within the call and request so additional material considerations as part of that better say the application site is obviously located in Great Abington so I'll get my pointer up so you've got the High Street just running along here and then there is a access way which runs along here and then up to the application site obviously the application does cover a wider area but the actual application site itself and the listed dwelling is just within this road bit here in terms of the site constraints so I've not included the access road on here but I've just sort of outlined the extent of the site so the application site is a grade 2 listed so the building itself where the proposal is being saw is this extent here which is Kurtvidge listed so in it itself is Kurtvidge listed to the main Farnhouse grade 2 listed building here to the north of the site is the grade 2 star parish church of St Mary's so that's to the north of the site there the site is also within the little and great Abington conservation area and it is located outside of the development framework to the south east of the site there is a cluster of listed buildings there are also some other residential dwellings to the south of the site these were previously associated with the farmhouse with its previous historic use but these are now all independently occupied there are no, it's not in any flood zone and it's marked in blue they are all surface water indicated but obviously none of that falls within the application site itself next slide is the aerial imagery of the site so once again where my cursor is now this is the actual listed building itself there is a single story link extension which is a modern extension I'll do our photos of that and I'll show that later but then you've got the cursor is listed barn which is here the other things I'd just like to point out are the pool house just to the north west of the site and the garage building to the south west of the site the reason why that's important is because as part of the previous approval cellar panels were approved on both of those buildings and as you can see I'd just like to point out one of the main key things within this part of the conservation area is obviously clay, pan, tile, roof tiles are very prominent within the character of the area there's quite a bit of planning history on the site so in 2022 there was quite a larger application full application and listed building application so the energy refurbishment of the listed building itself officers approved that there was some solar panels on the barn roof and the garage roof as well as the pool house roof which I'll show on a plan in a minute that was approved, there was quite a bit of discussion and negotiation in order to get that approved in the previous application some conditions have been discharged regarding the materials on the listed building condition of that the planning application once again a household a full planning application and the listed building application was submitted at the beginning of this year that was identical to what is before members today and that was refused and the reason for refusal is the same that is before commending today obviously there is a listed building application that is to be discussed after this application so the main planning considerations for this application is the impact the proposal would have on the fabric and setting of the listed building the impact it would have on the character and appearance of the conservation area whether there are any sustainability benefits of the proposal and obviously the previously determined planning applications are a material consideration as well so as part of the those 2022 applications that were approved so there were some alterations to the main farmhouse but I'm going to solely speak about the solar panels because obviously that is what the applicant is seeking to extend as part of this application so there was along the southern part of the southern slope of the garage there was solar arrays approved and proposed on there and then on the pool house there was the entire flat roof there was also solar arrays approved there was also six banks of solar panels approved on the cottage listed barn as well so the reason why it was separated was to ensure that you could still see the existing roof slope and that character that forms part of the listing so that's the reason why it was approved and designed as such in terms of the proposal within this what they're seeking to do is to essentially incorporate almost the entirety of the roof slope on the cottage listed barn they're not seeking to make any amendments to the pool house or the garage solar arrays but it is simply just that on the cottage listed barn here so that's what they're seeking to do in terms of elevations what was approved so as you can see there is the defined bank of six and six and six with gaps in between and there was a substantial gap between the solar arrays and then the listed building itself and then this is the other elevation it's all to have it on both roof slopes so once again banks of six three banks of six and there was a substantial gap between that and the listed building what they're seeking to do under this planning application sort of already indicated is that they're seeking to make it so that almost the entirety of the roof slope has solar PV panels there is a gap obviously it's not as large as the previous application that was approved after when on the site visit they have already some of them have already been installed I do have a photo of that as well from those that weren't able to visit the site this is the proposed elevations on the other side of the barn so this will be the western elevation sorry in terms of the site itself so this is the listed building here this is the sort of the link single story link extension which is a modern and then you've got the curses listed barn which is where they're proposing to put the solar panels this is just from a view within the great garden of the site so once again the listed building and then this here is the roof slope of the curses listed barn this is from within the other side of the garden so this is to the east west sorry so you've got this is the roof slope that would have the solar panels on this is just to indicate the modern link extension between the grey two listed building and then the curses listed barn and then this is just indicating the curses listed barn towards the grey two listed building so this next photo just shows that at present the solar panels have been built or partially built not in accordance with the approved plans but I'm assuming part way to what is being sought by the applicant today so yeah in terms of the application itself so regarding it being approved the main reason for approval would be the sustainability benefits that form part of the application and the fact that the dwelling itself would attempt to be carbon neutral and would be fully electric the reasons for refusal the officers recommend stating is that there will be harm to the grey two listed building and it's setting by virtue of the excessive amount of solar panels there will also be harm to the character and appearance of the grey and little Abingdon conservation area by virtue of it changing the character of the roof tiles which I've indicated earlier is part of the character also officers do not consider the sustainability benefits do not outweigh the heritage harm but no information has been submitted regarding sustainability benefits so officers are recommending refusal thank you chair thank you very much do we have any questions for clarification please council have the word can I just ask because obviously whatever happens whether this is approved or not we want to make sure that the structure of the there is no harm to the structure of the barn with what's proposed is there any concerns around losing any of the materials or any effecting the structure of the weight and things like that some older buildings wouldn't be able to take it is there any concerns around structure or is it simply preserving the aesthetics of the barn from my understanding there is no issue regarding the structure but obviously the conservation officer is objected and obviously hold that opinion that the proposal itself would impact on the aesthetics and the setting of the listed building and the conservation I have a question the pan tiles on the the building at the barn appeared to me to be concrete replacement pan tiles are they original pan tiles or are they of interest in them architectural quality in themselves my understanding there is no historical pan tiles are newer than they are not the original ones that were originally put on there but I'm not I can comment on whether they were concrete or whether they were clay councillor Fein thank you chair yes it was very helpful to see some photographs which I think showed the this application partially implemented what I don't think we've seen and maybe they're not available photographs of the approved solar panels as against the solar panels as they would look if this were implemented is there anything you can give us to guide us on that difference Paula can provide you with councillor Fein is just the plans on the elevational plans on here I couldn't comment on whether the applicant had originally implemented the approved scheme and whether they have added a gap in between from my site of photos I would indicate that that is probably not the case so I wouldn't be able to provide a photo in the instance but I can provide a photo I wonder if you go back to it of the panels as they are now which go beyond the approved yes I see so if the applicant were just implementing the existing planning consent there would be some gaps in that array that would be correct councillor thank you any other points of clarification thank you very much indeed now we move to the speakers the agent Mr Jeremy Lodge can you normally allow people three minutes so at the end of three minutes I will stop you thank you very much indeed thank you good afternoon councillors we're here today seeking planning permission to increase the already permitted number of PB panels on the roof of what was a cow shed the cow shed is only cartilage listed because it was physically connected to the farmhouse when it was renovated in the late 1970s the application is for an additional 12 panels on each side of what was the cow shed roof the only objection to the scheme is from the conservation officer due to the impact on the conservation area and the setting of the listed building the site itself is accessed down a private road and is screened from view by other buildings and is therefore well hidden within the conservation area the barn roof has a modern pantile roof covering it was put on in 1979 which remains in place and therefore the installation causes no damage to the fabric and is entirely reversible being on the barn the solar panels are away from the listed building and the argument that what has already got approval versus what we're now seeking approval for is therefore very arbitrary in our view the new application of a homogenous line of panels will look better than the already approved three blocks of panels on each side therefore this is an aesthetic judgment which needs to be balanced against the climate considerations with the additional panels the engineers calculations show that the building will then produce enough electricity to meet its annual demand which it won't in its current configuration of what we have approval for so this aspiration has to be in line with the south camps council resolution of September 2021 is that the assessment of public benefit cannot be blind to climate change nor to the context of the council's declaration of a climate emergency and it's as option of a zero carbon strategy the planning officers claims in their report that the onus lies with the applicant to prove the public good and that because this has not been satisfactorily proved he has made no meaningful attempt to balance heritage and climate considerations however we understand that this is contrary to MPPF paragraph 158 which says that when determining planning applications for renewable and low carbon development local planning authorities should not require applicants to demonstrate the overall need for renewable or low carbon energy and recognise that even small scale projects provide a valuable contribution to cutting green house gas emissions we'd like to conclude by quoting councillor Smith who said when the planning officers overturned the recommendation for refusal of PV panels at King's College in Cambridge to recommend approval in conclusion people need to have at the forefront of their minds that climate change is resulting in catastrophic irreversible harm to life on earth our prime responsibility must be to take every opportunity to reduce carbon emissions however modest and not be distracted in that mission by minimal harm to a single historic building thank you very much for your time thank you very much indeed do we have questions or points of clarification from the from the applicant thank you very much councillor red councillor red thank you chair through you I'd just like to ask about what alternatives we looked at into other ways of making your property net zero did you look at ground based solar or any additional efficiency measures thank you so the first application, the major application we put in all the insulation that we could so we insulated all the floors we changed all the windows in the barn we applied to change windows in the farmhouse but that was felt not to be appropriate so that was removed from the application we applied to externally insulate the farmhouse as well because it's existing cement render which isn't good but one of the reasons it's listed is the oak frame the 16th century part of the farmhouse it's internal so it's covered in cement render we applied as part of that application to change that cement render put on a line based render that would help it breathe with external insulation that wasn't well received by conservation officers so again that got admitted so effectively we have done we've put in a mechanical ventilation heat recovery system we've done everything we physically can to the fabric of the building the conservation and planning allowed so we've taken out the oil boiler and put in air source heat pumps that the sheer quantity of heat that is required our current solar panels will not produce the amount of energy that will need it annually which is why we're looking to increase the number of solar panels to meet the consumption thank you a point of clarification actually from the officer I think might be available the fact that they can meet their own demands for their own building is what I would see as a private benefit the issue is really whether the total but the increase in actual production whoever uses it would be considered a sustainability benefit am I right in that interpretation yes in a way in the fact that the public benefits would be extremely limited in the fact that they would be solely only by whoever is using that property within the design and access statement that was provided there was figures provided to indicate what was required however officers felt like there was no additional detail that backed up that information so we were unable to make a proper decision regarding that so I couldn't comment on whether there would be any other public benefits outside of that because I don't know what the usage is of what part of the dwelling no but my point is that basically whether he uses the energy to sell it or to use it for the dwelling is relatively relevant the relevant point is that the increase of renewable production which is a sustainability element that needs to be taken into account am I right in that interpretation do you see the difference because to set against the harm you have to have public benefits yes I understand what you mean obviously I don't know whether any of the solar weight raise whether that energy would go back into the grid we once again we have not provided that information whether that would then go back in there so once you are correct the public benefit would be limited in that sense but the information is not there so I can now ask now ask the applicant whether the installation would be quick connected yes it would thank you very much have you any other thank you very much indeed now you come to the local member Councillor Henry back as you know it's three minutes thank you chair hopefully I won't use up all three minutes worth noting I have submitted written comments as well in case I couldn't make it today but I thought given the fact it was me that called it in and extended your afternoons is probably polite that I do turn up and give reasons for that also worth noting that Councillor John Batch of the other local member for Abingdon does support these comments as well so I am speaking on behalf of the two local members today so quite an interesting one I think for you as a committee given that it's weighing up potential benefits to the environment compared to views from our conservation officer as you can see in the report there are two reasons the conservation officer gives for recommending refusal of the application first one being impact on the conservation area as we've heard from the agent of the applicant from those of you that have been to the site and seen it and from the photos the whole site and the solar panel specifically cannot be seen from the public realm so they're not visible from the high street they're not visible from the church they're not visible from the recreation grounds so the impact on the conservation area in our view as local members is minimal to zero the second reason for refusal is the impact on the adjacent building which is grade 2 listed our view is that because or one there are already solar panels on the roof which do benefit from planning permission so adding more solar panels to this in our opinion well if there is going to be damage to the heritage asset that has happened by the fact that planning permission has already been granted for solar panels and the principle has been established so if more were to be added to that our view is that would not have any more of a detrimental impact than the first set that are already installed also worth noting as well that there was a motion that was referred to a bit earlier passed back in September 21 asking the council to be give more weight in planning to applications that are trying to balance climate change against heritage concerns our view is with the backing of that motion the benefits of this application do outwey the harm and it's also worth harking back to MPPF paragraph 158 which again was referenced previously the key section of that paragraph saying that recognize that even small scale projects provide a valuable contribution to cutting greenhouse gas emissions so whether it's a private benefit or a public the cutting of the greenhouse gas emissions is a planning consideration you can use as a planning committee so in summary I don't know how long I've got but in summary our view is as local members that the two reasons for refusal outlined by the conservation officer do not outwey the clear benefits that this application brings thank you thank you very much do we have any questions for the councillor after that council William sorry I have real fears that your headset was going to get pinked back at you then sorry it's a little short on that so through yourself to councillor bachelor obviously you'll be well aware about the difference between the political function of the council and motions and the statutory element that the planning committee holds I think that's important that we're really clear about that but you said you quoted an MPPF and I didn't catch the number so I'm asking if you could repeat that for us because obviously that would be a policy that would be helpful in your argument paragraph 158 of the MPPF I don't see any others thank you very much Mary could you like planning officers paragraph 155 yes I think that would be helpful if you could explain paragraph 158 okay you had a chance to look thank you I think we now move on to a debate who would like to open the discussion of the debate councillor Fane in the absence of anyone else wishing to do so you've already raised the point yourself that this is not just about some form of self-sufficiency this would be connected to the grid so the benefits of solar power and renewable energy are more general in this case we've already looked at paragraph 158 of the MPPF and it seems to me both paragraphs A and C are very relevant C refers of course as we saw just now to existing sites and extending and increasing solar on those sites being preferred which is what is effectively happening here I would refer also to paragraph 8C of the MPPF but before I do that I have a question of retaining the gaps between solar panels now I don't know about other members but when I look at solar for instance the roofs of most of our council houses and so on what is it that draws my attention to them it is the gaps where because we don't currently have triangular panels available it highlights the roof behind a roof which is well done either solar integration which is not the case here or solar panels throughout is much less obvious in my view that's a personal view and I accept the conservation officers have professional expertise in this but then I look at paragraph 8C of the MPPF this occurred to me because this morning we had a briefing from conservation officers and one of the points that was made is that the conservation is embedded in achieving sustainable development in all its senses that's paragraphs that's why I mentioned paragraph 8C of the MPPF achieving sustainable development where we all know that that's the three parts an environmental objective obviously to protect and enhance our natural built and historic environment but also to improve biodiversity use natural resources minimised waste and pollution so on mitigating and adapting to climate change including moving to a low carbon economy now those statements that Bridget Smith the leader was quoted as a very valuable statement on this and of course our own policy motion in 2021 are relevant to that objective they are not separate statements of policy they are attempting to define our approach to planning in the light of the MPPF and compatible with it and it is quite clear to me that we need to ensure that conservation objectives now include energy conservation as one of those objectives and that it is compatible with the MPPF to say so so in this case I broadly entirely accept the arguments that were made by councillor Henry bachelor and supported by the other councillor bachelor that I think there is every reason to approve this application and therefore to reject the recommendation of the officers thank you chair councillor Heather Williams thank you chair first of all I would say I actually think when we look at the different roles of officers and committee officers we give them the policies we give them the rules and then it is their job to adhere to those and to advise on those and then it is up to us if we want to sort of steer or create flexibility in our decisions so I can understand why officers have come to the conclusions they have and I think that they have good grounds for what they are proposing to us however it has been called in and we have heard an argument and looked through and thank you very much the copy of the MPPF and I think as a committee we have a flex that officers don't have in the decision making process and using that flex I think we can run an argument on the gaps I can understand why that would be aesthetically better and I say that because if you've got the gaps it can give an appearance of windows as opposed to to build solar and I know that later it has been used so I can understand why but equally I can understand wanting to get the maximum amount of the building if they went all the way up then that would be slightly different so I wouldn't recommend going as far up to that end of building but given the position we are in I think we are in a position where we could come to a different conclusion than officers given we have slightly different parameters Do we have any other comments? I don't see any others I would comment as well I tend to agree with council of fame that a larger block I found that the break between the panels disruptive you see these I felt that you would feel the shape of the roof more clearly if it was one central block I am not totally convinced about the argument in terms of the pan-tiled roof it was interesting that we suspected looking at it on site that the roof was a modern roof and that was proved though the building itself is obviously much older it's an old English block a bond it's a solid wall it's presumably something like 100 years old or something like that but it's not particularly interesting itself so the question really the only question is about the impact upon the listed building which I agree with the arguments in terms of the conservation area that is not visible the impact is minimal to the public realm the reason area of the pan-tiled roof left at the end on the proposal at the end of the building personally is we've already got approval for an application of blocks of solar panels is the filling in these blocks and making a single block going to create less than substantial harm and as we've been told in the briefing this morning that is actually significant harm or is it just harm which is less than less than substantial coupled with the arguments in terms of sustainability and the arguments in MPPF which suggest that we should give significant weight to increasing the amount of renewable energy as what we've been told it's not the private benefit it's not a consideration it's a public benefit and the public benefit of increasing supply of renewable energy which in this case will go to be great is an relevant consideration for us coupled I personally feel that a solid block is better but I think the argument that the difference between these three blocks and a solid block it creates a significant harm more harm than what you have already I feel that's the test that we have and I don't feel that can be justified I personally don't feel that impact, visual impact is significant enough to count as what I call a significant harm which is what less than substantial means so to my view right councillor Williamson councillor Fein is that we should accept the councillor the local councillor's argument and support this application have you got no more comments I think we can proceed to a vote okay thank you to clarify if you vote for the motion vote for in this you're voting to refuse the application as per the recommendation if you vote against you're voting to approve the application contrary to the office's recommendation okay sorry yes can I have a second please sorry can we start again can we start the vote again are you second we'll go to the vote again okay thank you very much indeed can we just deal with conditions that's okay if that's okay if I can share my screen hold on a second I'm just madly trying to draft them it transpires that the panels that are detailed on this application aren't those that were approved under the previous permission and so we will suggestion is that sorry I'm just trying to share my screen at the same time that we get details to be submitted so that the list of building officers can approve them so I can share my screen I'm happy to propose that condition I'll second it I'll second it and given that it's a retrospective as such now given that they've been installed at three months of the date of their decision rather than prior to commencement because obviously it's already been commenced that was the only condition I was going to propose okay can we approve by affirmation the proposed condition do I need a seconder for the approval of the affirmation we didn't have one okay thank you councillor councillor William now we move on to Great Abington application for List of Building Consent 23 stroke 03175 stroke LBC 8653 to Great Abington it's a continuation basically a complemented to the previous application enlargement to previously permitted a photovoltaic area on a barn roof the key issues are the impact of the fabric of the List of Building sustainability the application has been called by councillor Henry Batchel and the recommendation is to refuse Thomas Chain of Isla presenting officer do you want to present to going? Of course I'm going to present again chair the only thing I wanted to just indicate is that obviously we're only considering the impact on the fabric of the List of Building rather than the conservation area or anything like that so it's simply just the impact on the fabric of the List of Building but I won't put members through an entire slideshow again Do we wish to go through the whole presentations again or are we willing to debate this beforehand what's your sorry chair through you as in the officer presentation again and the member and the applicant and so on no I don't think I don't think we do no it's a follow Do we want to have any discussion any debate upon this don't you wish to enter the debate can I propose that we go directly to the vote again in the light I second that OK can we take this by affirmation I agree just for the record we are affirming that we are going against the officer's recommendation and approving the application thank you OK the application is approved now we move to the compliance report Chris isn't with us so OK thank you very much unfortunately Chris has had to go to another meeting so you've got me instead today however I will just talk through Chris's report so apologies that it was slightly late coming but we were waiting until the end of the month so we had the full month of stats so on the 1st of November we had 521 open cases of which 269 were in South Cambridgeshire since the 1st of January we've had a total of 696 compliance referrals across both councils the statistical data was attached Chris has provided some updates to service delivery namely that hello I'm the delivery manager now compliance as well as DM South Toby has moved over to look after section 106 and so the next part of the report is slightly different to what you'd normally been expecting Chris's advice if members wish to for specific updates on cases they have an involvement in then to contact him and he'll be able to update you however one proposal we are suggesting going forward is once members have alerted Chris to a case that they wish to seek an update on for that update to be provided or quarterly whichever you choose to the committee outside of the general committee update report so that all members are kept abreast of significant cases so rather than just one update or an update being provided to the member who requested it we'll update the whole of committee he's provided provided a response to a question which I think you raised Councillor Carn about suggestions on how the compliance service could be improved hopefully you'll be aware that we have recently put in place some better services for internal and external parties so the improvements that we've made when the compliance complaints are now submitted by an email address that if we get them from an email address acknowledgements are provided directly to the complainant and that gives them the direct point of contact for the officer dealing with the case now that our technical support team has taken over responsibility for logging, registering and setting up the new compliance files so that cases are being picked up quicker when a complaint is made and each one's consistently got the same amount of information or the same level of information when it's made and acknowledgement is sent out without delay after the initial complaint if we have an email address and we're also setting targets for performance management officers against the compliance policy so you'll see from this month you'll see that we have a report on undertaking site visits which officers have been monitored against now as well and that's broken down into categories which are set out in the report so high priority which is five working days for a site visit medium priority, ten working days and lower priority for twenty working days first part of a wider set of performance measures to improve the way we investigate complaints and also monitoring that we're actually improving our service overall management team will also be monitoring performance against those targets as the year goes on it is an incremental process for improving the compliance service so we're starting at the beginning of the service in terms of registering and visiting sites and slowly as the year goes on we're setting targets to improve as the year goes on so hopefully in answer to that question we're trying we're putting systems in place to help improve the service for complainants residents and also for officers within the team the next part is also a suggestion for future reports on the data that we bring to you so at the minute Chris is bringing in the number of open cases on hand but I think what we're proposing if members agree going forward is the number of cases open on hand plus then number of cases open on hand older than six months, number of cases on hand newer than six months a breakdown of the total number of cases by officer and by council and then the number of closures each month and each quarter as well so hopefully that will give members a bit more information Councillor Williams I appreciate the timing because obviously that's something I said about it's hard to know if it's cases dragging on or whether it's fresh cases so I think that along with perhaps an average an average time would help as well just for us to get an idea of and also for us to be able to help manage expectations when people come to us of what the average time is just in relation I should declare sorry in interest that I'm local member for one of the appeals which just because I scroll through I've just reminded myself so if you can make a note of that sorry when it comes to the request I think we just need some system to make sure it's clear because obviously a lot of us will I know I speak with enforcement about things in my patch but they're not significant things for committee because what you said was if a committee member asks for something related to everything I'm sure that not all committee members want to know what's going on in the Mordans so I think if we have it that as committee members that we're clear not if we're as a local member but if we're requesting it as a planning committee member and some sort of system to make sure we don't just get everybody's as lovely as it is to hear everyone's local issues I'm sure I think that could create a lot of email traffic if we're not careful is it possible to sort out the trivial from the I'm sure there can be a discussion between the committee member, any member and Chris as to which ones are the ones to bring into planning committee can I just ask on the average time to close cases would that be helpful if we could appreciate it would be only going forward from the 1st of November if we broke that down in terms of the priority categories I'm just thinking of more stats that look stats so that would be great the more stats the better anything that's a high priority obviously you'd want closing down quicker or dealing with quicker I don't think would that be a significant workload to do this sorting act no so Councillor Fane yes I support said earlier about not every case that we've raised with Chris or others needs to be circulated whole committee particularly in those cases where it proves that I've many asked him a stupid question and the other point that I'm finding is that quite a few cases two problems one is that they involve quite a few potential sources of enforcement or compliance that is in some cases there might be breaches of the environment protection act in 1990 burning bomb fires, plastic works and bomb fires and so on different team and in some cases might even involve the county council and I think we need to look at how we best coordinate that largely a matter for management for officers the other point is that I'm finding quite often when we have set construction management plans for small developments we subsequently find that some of the conditions that are in those are unenforceable because it was not possible to meet conditions such as all traffic being off the road, there isn't room for it and whilst I accept we need to be careful about that and perhaps to vary the plans to take account of that I do think we're right as a committee over the last four or five years we have increasingly said that these construction management are not just as they conventionally were for developments of over five houses that the impact of construction is if anything even greater when you have a small site between two houses on the neighbours and therefore I accept we need to ensure that what we are setting out is realistic and enforceable otherwise we merely disappoint people but I think also we have to still insist that we do in many cases need construction management plans just for small sites if I could just say on that we are in the process of finalising our review of all of our standard conditions and Chris is feeding into that to making sure that our standard conditions are enforceable and also when we write bespoke conditions ones are on our standard list we are encouraging officers and then to go to the enforcement manager or somebody in enforcement as well to ensure that they are enforceable as well compliance of sorry one of the one of the situations that is quite clear from some of the cases that have come up is that where we have to submit a plan for instance in each studs for landscaping and so on it's one thing to have submit a plan but if then it's not adhered to it's very difficult to enforce and I think it's very important that considering the standard consideration conditions that we make sure that if somebody submits a plan if there is a condition in it which allows you to enforce it if it's not adhered to we've had a particular problem in my village in hunters close which has been developed and which has been major problems with drainage even though the drainage plan was approved and we had no tools to take action afterwards and it's really done editing what was done by discussion and negotiation but it wasn't there was no tool and I think that needs teeth Councillor William So sorry there was one thing I forgot to mention I'm sure we're all very pleased that Tony's getting his new knee because he's waited quite a while bless him but can we just have reassurance that obviously that's a long term that he's going to be having surgery we'll have before that we've got somebody into cover and we're not running a vacancy there So I can advise what's happening at the minute so one of the other compliance officers who's relatively new had an introductory caseload I'll say and so they are picking up anything that's coming in new that would normally be allocated to Tony and Chris is working with that officer in terms of Tony's existing caseload Chris is keeping an eye on it and then myself and Chris are also having a look at it each week on the older ones and dividing the workload out to put someone to look at and we have got some assistance from the technical support team on helping sending some letters out and doing bits and pieces for us as well so we're coping at the minute is how it's working at present Can I just say I think all committee will hope totally well with his surgery He's had his surgery and he has been coming to team meetings because he's bored at home Okay, is that all the comments? Thank you very much indeed Now we move on to appeals back to Rebecca On this one at present again the report hopefully will change going forward I'm changing baby steps one thing at a time So at the minute it's a summary of the decisions received and the appeals received as well as those awaiting decision and awaiting statements Members have got questions on anyone in particular if you could please give me a shout and then I can provide a response on those after the meeting Thank you Councillor Wood, Wilson Thank you I just have a quick question On here we've got appeal dismissed but we've got something appeal turned away What's the difference? So appeal turned away is where pins have declined to accept the appeal Thank you very much Now we move on to the dates of next meeting The dates of next meeting is going to be held on the 13th Wednesday the 13th of December and with that I close the committee