Agenda and draft minutes

J Foster, Vice-Chair (Planning) (in the Chair) outlined the procedure which would be followed at the meeting.

Apologies for absence were received from Councillors Dickinson, Jackson and Murphy.

Minutes of the meetings of the Castle Morpeth Local Area Council held on Monday 8 November 2021 and Monday 10 January 2022, as circulated, to be confirmed as a true record and signed by the Chair

RESOLVED that the minutes of the meetings of the Castle Morpeth Local Area Council held on Monday 8 November 2021 and Monday 10 January 2022, as circulated, be confirmed as a true record and be signed by the Chair.

Unless already entered in the Council’s Register of Members’ interests, members are required to disclose any personal interest (which includes any disclosable pecuniary interest) they may have in any of the items included on the agenda for the meeting in accordance with the Code of Conduct adopted by the Council on 4 July 2012, and are reminded that if they have any personal interests of a prejudicial nature (as defined under paragraph 17 of the Code Conduct) they must not participate in any discussion or vote on the matter and must leave the room. NB Any member needing clarification must contact the monitoring officer by email at monitoringofficer@northumberland.gov.uk. Please refer to the guidance on disclosures at the rear of this agenda letter.

Councillor Beynon declared a personal interest in planning application 20/02049/FUL and would take no part in the determination of the application.

Councillor Beynon left the meeting at 4.04 pm.

To request the committee to decide the planning applications attached to this report using the powers delegated to it.   

Please note that printed letters of objection/support are not circulated with the agenda but are available on the Council’s website at  http://www.northumberland.gov.uk/Planning.aspx 

The report requested the Committee to decide the planning applications attached to the report using the powers delegated to it.  Members were reminded of the principles which should govern their consideration of the applications, the procedure for handling representations, the requirement of conditions and the need for justifiable reasons for the granting of permission or refusal of planning applications. 

RESOLVED that the information be noted.

Remove green keepers compound and erection of 48 dwellings (including 10 affordable houses) plus upgrade of access road, electric substation, SUDs, domestic package treatment works and domestic gas storage.- Amended description

Land North West Of Burgham Park Golf Club, Burgham Park, Felton, Northumberland

Remove green keeper’s compound and erection of 48 dwellings (including 10 affordable houses) plus upgrade of access road, electric substation, SUDs, domestic package treatment works and domestic gas storage – amended description.

Land west of Burgham Park Golf Club, Burgham Park, Felton, Northumberland.

Tamsin Wood provided updates from Public Protection in relation to the following conditions which should be amended to read:-

Condition 18

If during development contamination not previously considered within any statement/report that has received the approval of the Planning Authority is identified, then a written Method Statement regarding this material shall be submitted to and approved in writing by the Local Planning Authority - the written Method Statement should be written by a competent person.  No building shall be occupied until a Method Statement has been submitted to and approved in writing by the Local Planning Authority, and measures proposed to deal with the contamination have been carried out.  (Should no contamination be found during development then the applicant shall submit a signed statement indicating this to discharge this condition).  Competent person has the same definition as defined within the NPPF.

Condition 19

No building shall be constructed above damp proof course level until a report detailing the protective measures to prevent the ingress of ground gases, including depleted Oxygen (<19%), to the CS2 standard specified in BS8485:2015 (Code of Practice for the design of protective measures for Methane and Carbon Dioxide ground gases for new buildings) have been submitted to and approved in writing by the Local Planning Authority.  The aforementioned report must also detail to the Local Planning Authority’s satisfaction how the annulus of service ducts will be sealed to prevent gas ingress into the living space of the dwelling.  Furthermore, the report shall contain full details of the validation and verification assessment to be undertaken on the installed ground gas protection, as detailed in CIRIA C735 (Good practice on the testing and verification of protection systems for buildings against hazardous ground gases).    

Condition 20

No building shall be brought into use or occupied until the applicant has submitted a validation and verification report to the approved methodology in Condition 19 which has been approved in writing by the LPA.

Condition 25

Prior to the first occupation of the development, a verification report carried out by a qualified drainage engineer or suitably qualified professional must be submitted to and approved by the Local Planning Authority, to demonstrate that all sustainable drainage systems for the dwelling to be occupied have been constructed as per the agreed scheme.  This verification report shall include *As built drawings for all SuDS components – including dimensions (base levels, inlet/outlet elevations, areas, depths, lengths, diameters, gradients etc); *Construction details (component drawings, materials vegetation); * Health and Safety file: and *Details of ownership.

Ms Wood continued to introduce the application with the aid of a power point presentation.

Following the presentation, Rob Murfin, Executive Director of Planning and Economy informed the committee that this was a highly unusual application and officers  ...  view the full minutes text for item 89.

For Members’ information to report the progress of planning appeals.  This is a monthly report and relates to appeals throughout all 5 Local Area Council Planning Committee areas and covers appeals of Strategic Planning Committee.

RESOLVED that the information be noted.

A short recess was taken at this point and Councillor Dodd left.  The meeting reconvened at 5.21 pm.

The report sets out the details of the draft Local Transport Plan (LTP) programme for 2022-23 for consideration and comment by the Local Area Council, prior to final approval of the programme by the Interim Executive Director of Planning and Local Services in consultation with the Cabinet Member for Environment and Local Services.

The report set out details of the draft Local Transport Plan (LTP) programme for 2022-23 for consideration and comment by the Local Area Council, prior to final approval of the programme by the Interim Executive Director of Planning and Local Services in consultation with the Cabinet Members for Environment and Local Services.

The Local Transport Plan grant allocation was determined for the Council by the Department of Transport (DfT) who had yet to announce the capital allocations for 2022/23.  At this stage, an indicative figure of just over £23 million had been assumed.

The Council’s Local Transport Plan would consist of improvements and maintenance schemes to address four key areas – walking and cycling; safety; roads; and bridges, structures and landslips.  Identifying road safety issues included consideration of priorities put forward by the County Council and Parish and Town Councils last year.  Appendices A – D set out the details of the programme.

The walking and cycling allocation was split between improvements for crossings, footpaths, bus stops and the design of permanent pedestrianisation in Alnwick, and maintenance of footways and cycleways and maintenance of the rights of way network. 

The Council continued with its initiative for the Local Cycling and Walking Infrastructure Plans known as LCWIPs for the main towns in Northumberland and this would be consulted on in the near future.

It had been noted that a number of County Councillors and Parish and Town Councils had put forward priorities for the introduction of new cycleways and footways, which had been considered beyond the funding available through the LTP programme.  The details of those had been but captured separately so they could be considered for any future sources of external funding.  The details of the LTP Walking and Cycling Programme was set out in Appendix A, attached to the report.

Integrated Transport Programme and funding generally was concentrated to the safety of the highway network.  £695,000 was aimed at reducing the number and severity of road traffic causalities through a programme of local safety schemes.

The implementation of the 20 mph outside of schools would continue and £500,000 had been allocated to complete the programme.  107 schemes had been completed with a further 10 that had been issued for design.  An allocation of £350,000 had been made for refurbishment and renewal of existing signage and road markings.

A range of maintenance activities including resurfacing, patching, surface dressing, micro surfacing together with allocations through capital repairs for drainage and traffic signals was developed through asset management principles.

In addition to the LTP programme, the Council were planning to invest a £2m programme on U and C roads.  Details of the draft Roads Programme was attached as Appendix C.

An allocation of over £2 million had been made for bridge maintenance which included a programme of bridge strengthening and remained a key objective.

An allocation of £2,423,000 for landslips would enable stabilisation work to prevent deterioration and loss of use of the network with a major scheme at Todstead  ...  view the full minutes text for item 91.