Falkirk councillors agreed to protect greenbelt land as they refused permission for 150 new homes on Carronshore farmland.
Housebuilders Taylor Wimpey told members of Falkirk Council’ s planning committee on Wednesday that development on Roughlands Farm, Carronshore, would bring much needed new homes and huge economic benefits to the area.
The company’s land and planning manager Naomi Cunningham told the meeting that the development would include 35 “affordable homes”, which she promised would not be flats but “high quality houses”.
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The company also argued that the site, surrounded by roads and housing, would not compromise the greenbelt but would ’round off’ development in the area.
However, a report by council planners made clear that they did not support the plans.
Council officers want to see new housebuilding coming through as part of the local development plan so that local issues – such as the capacity of education, health services and roads – can be considered more widely.
That is particularly important in the Stenhousemuir area which has seen thousands of homes built in recent years and many of the 113 objections from members of the public highlighted the problems with health and schools in particular.
NHS Forth Valley also informed planning that four out of the five GP practices in the Larbert and Stenhousemuir area are currently full and the remaining one does not have enough space to accommodate any new houses.
Larbert High School is also struggling to cope with the numbers – it currently has more than 2000 pupils and is the second largest school in Scotland – but there is limited space for any more expansion.
The developers pointed out that, if agreed, Taylor Wimpey would have made contributions of nearly £1 million to mitigate any problems.
Three local councillors, who are also members of the planning committee objected strongly to the application.
Councillor Jim Flynn said the new housing would effectively be “an island surrounded by busy, busy roads”, with no safe walking route to local schools.
Webster Avenue and nearby Mill Road, both of have “pinch points” with congestion that he believed would be made worse by increased traffic.
And he was not convinced by proposals for a new path which would run alongside New Carron Road, which is “incredibly busy”.
“We’re going to increase the hazard – this is nonsense! We should be trying to minimise the hazard, not increase it,” he said.
Cllr Gary Bouse also said he did not support the development as he felt the development was “too small” and a bigger proposal would be needed for infrastructure to be created to deal with issues.
Cllr Laura Murtagh proposed supporting the planners’ recommendations in order to protect the greenbelt.
She said: “It’s a really important part of the greenbelt. The character of this part of the ward would change completely.
“If you put housing there and rounded off the development, you would no longer have that rural view out towards the Ochils.”
Councillor Flynn also said he supported the greenbelt, saying they were gradually losing the distinction between communities.
“It’s the wrong development, in the wrong area at the wrong time,” he said.
All members of the committee supported the officers’ recommendations to reject Taylor Wimpey’s plans.
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