Ongoing planning application: Land at Great Missenden Railway Station (Planning Application ref PL/21/0534/FA)

In March 2021, a developer called Peker Holdings submitted a planning application for two new 4 storey blocks of flats on the plots currently used for selling cars on either side of the entrance road to Great Missenden station. This application also included a road for vehicles entering and leaving Peker's site for new houses (approved but not yet built) behind the High Street. 

The developer submitted the original planning applications in March 2021, with minor redesigns in November 2021, January 2022 and August 2022.

On each occasion, the GMVA committee, together with many GMVA members, other residents, and other local organisations, welcomed the redevelopment of this brown field site, and welcomed the proposed new access road to and from the consented new housing scheme between the High Street and the railway. However, we all objected to the design and redesigns for these flats at the station because they were too high, too massive in scale, and would overbearingly dominate our small, historic village. Furthermore, the parking provisions were clearly inadequate, and no provision had been made for the impact of all the additional vehicles using the junction with Station Approach, just below the bridge, which is already a difficult junction to pull out of.

The GMVA Committee have written four letters to Buckinghamshire Council planning department dated 20th April 2021, 20th December 2021, 25th February 2022 and 23rd August 2022, setting out our concerns in response to the original application and the subsequent redesigns. 

Since October 2022, no document has been posted by anyone on the council planning website page regarding this planning application (there had been 269 documents up to this point) - and the planning department have said that no decision on this site is likely until later this year. 

This is because, as we understand it, there was a ruling last year that any new residential development within a 12.6km radius of the Ashridge Estate or Tring Park has to provide suitable alternative natural green spaces for recreation, in order to alleviate the pressure on the usage of the Ashridge Estate and Tring Park, which have now been designated as Special Areas of Conservation (SAC), known as the Chiltern Beechwoods SAC. The Great Missenden station site lies just inside this zone and it is assumed that the developer is still preparing a response to this unforeseen ruling.

The GMVA Committee will update our members when there is any more news on this key planning application for our village.