‘No more new houses’: Harrogate residents and councillors call on council to remove sites from Local Plan

Around 50 people attended the Green Hut on Harlow Avenue on Wednesday for a meeting of Harlow and Pannal Ash Residents Association (HAPARA).

Up to 4,000 homes could be built in the Western arc of Harrogate but there have been long-standing concerns that the area’s roads, schools and healthcare facilities will not be able to cope.

Residents were dismayed at the publication of a ‘parameters plan’ document last year that was drawn up by Harrogate Borough Council to identify infrastructure requirements for the area.

Plans for 770 homes and a primary school on land behind RHS Harlow Carr has already been submitted by Anywl Land and Redrow Homes.

On the other side of the road, Homes England has submitted plans to build 480 homes.

The homes would be built in phases meaning residents living in the area could face a decade or more of disruption.

Neither application on Otley Road has been approved yet and residents at the meeting said there was a glimmer of hope that North Yorkshire Council could remove the sites when it develops its new county-wide Local Plan.

Harrogate Borough Council’s Local Plan will be replaced by the document before 2028.

Malcolm Margolis said Harrogate Borough Council’s plan was “obviously out of date and needs changing”.

He said: “I read about 50 local authorities have cancelled their Local Plan and started again.

“I can’t understand why North Yorkshire cant take a similar approach and revisit all this.”

One woman said: “The government says we don’t need as many houses as before.

"It seems sensible to me as a layperson why aren’t these plans revisited and some sites taken out?”

Conservative councillor for Oatlands and Pannal, John Mann, said he will be pushing the new authority to reconsider sites that have not already been granted planning permission.

He said: “I will be insisting we look afresh at some of these sites that are in the plan and have not yet come forward and I will call for these sites to be revisited.”

However, chair of Haverah Park with Beckwithshaw Parish Council, Derek Spence, said residents would have to be realistic as the new Local Plan is five years away from completion and in that time developers would look to secure planning permission.

Councillor Spence said: “If they see that door closing what are they going to do?

"Commercially, they’ll start putting in planning applications – it’s pretty obvious.

"If you were them that’s what you’d have to do to protect your investment.”