proposed green belt declassification around panshanger park

PROPOSED GREEN BELT DECLASSIFICATION AROUND
PANSHANGER PARK
Introduction
Panshanger Park is recognised as a nationally important Grade II* landscape where recreation,
nature conservation and agriculture is fully integrated and managed as a living landscape, set within
the wider countryside and delivering habitat and access connectivity. It’s significance is recognised by
owners Lafarge Tarmac, Hertfordshire County Council, Herts & Middlesex Wildlife Trust, English
Heritage and the Friends of Panshanger Park which represents a wide range of local organisations.
East Herts District Council and Welwyn Hatfield Borough Council are currently developing strategic
housing plans and selecting major development sites. Many sites in the vicinity of Panshanger Park
are being considered, sites which would require the declassification of Green Belt in all but one case.
The below map shows the proposed East Herts sites in blue and Welwyn Hatfield sites in red.
The Welwyn Hatfield plan will be coming out to public consultation in early 2015. The above sites
have been approved by its Cabinet as favourable locations. The East Herts District Plan has been
through public consultation and the Council has conducted its own Green Belt review, This in house
assessment is now being reviewed by Peter Brett Associates as a ‘critical friend’.
This paper addresses East Herts District Council proposals for declassification of Green Belt.
“Protecting our Green Belt must be paramount” Secretary of State - Eric Pickles
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On 6 October 2014 the Government’s Department for Communities and Local Government’s
Secretary of State, Eric Pickles and his Minister, Brandon Lewis, in a press release entitled ‘Councils
must protect our Green Belt’ reiterated that “Ministers have underlined the Government’s commitment
to protect the Green Belt from development”.
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The “new guidance…reaffirms how councils should use their Local Plan drawing on protections in the
National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) to safeguard their local areas against urban sprawl and
protect the green lungs around towns and cities”.
At a time when East Herts District Council and Welwyn Hatfield Borough Council are proposing to declassify parts of its Green Belt in order to build on it, Eric Pickles says, “This government has been
very clear that when planning for new buildings, protecting our Green Belt must be paramount”.
In this recent “new guidance”, the Government poses the question, “Do housing and economic needs
override constraints on the use of land such as Green Belt?” and answers it by saying that, “need
alone is not the only factor to be considered when drawing up a Local Plan,” and that, “Green Belt
boundaries should only be altered in exceptional circumstances”, and cites paragraph 83 of the
NPPF, where two of the restraints to development are designated heritage assets and Green Belt,
both of which apply to Panshanger Park. EHDC’s plan to declassify parts of its Green Belt for building
purposes does not meet this criterion of “in exceptional circumstances”. It risks the expense of this
plan being thrown out by the Department for Communities and Local Government or later rejected by
a legal challenge.
The Green Belt Around Panshanger Park
East Herts District Council claims that, “Land east of Welwyn Garden City is required for development
in order to address unmet housing needs from villages west of the East Herts area as well as from
nearby Hertford”. This flies in the face of the Secretary of State’s earlier-mentioned view that “need
alone is not the only factor to be considered” when deciding to allow development on the Green Belt.
Where is the “exceptional need” which requires over 3000 houses to be built on the Birchall Farm
Green Belt land and the land west of Hertford? Both of these proposed developments contradict the
NPPF’s reference to Green Belt as vital to “check the unrestricted sprawl of large built-up areas”, to
“prevent neighbouring towns merging into one another” and to “assist in safeguarding the countryside
from encroachment”.
Protecting The Countryside From Encroachment
This last point is also important in respect of preserving and enhancing East Herts’ wildlife and
making sure that people can access nature and benefit from it. In the important Governmentcommissioned report (2010), ‘Making Space for Nature’, the report’s author, Professor Lawton warns
that, “There is compelling evidence that England’s collection of wildlife sites are generally too small
and too isolated, leading to declines in many of England’s characteristic species” and that, “a new
type of Environmental Stewardship scheme is needed, particularly to help buffer sites and establish
stepping stones and ecological corridors”.
The important wildlife site of Panshanger Park is adjacent to these proposed development areas on
Green Belt between Hertford and Welwyn Garden City, as are a number of smaller wildlife sites and
pockets of registered ancient woodland. Lawton’s report makes clear that key wildlife sites such as
these need protecting by “buffers” otherwise their functioning will be impaired. East Herts’
declassifying of these areas as Green Belt would destroy the “buffers”. Lawton writes that there is a
need for ecological corridors around and between wildlife sites in order for them to survive. There
would then be, “Better places for wildlife – creating more and better-connected habitats at a
landscape scale, providing space for wildlife to thrive and adapt to climate change: better places for
people – through enhancing a wide range of benefits that nature provides, such as recreation
opportunities, flood protection, cleaner water and carbon storage”.
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Rather than destroying this Green Belt, EHDC should be in the business, as the NPPF lays down, of
contributing “to conserving and enhancing the natural environment…promoting the vitality of our main
urban areas, protecting the Green Belts around them, recognising the intrinsic character and beauty
of the countryside”. Even more clear is the NPPF’s core principle that, “Allocations of land for
development should prefer land of lesser environmental value”.
Assisting In Urban Regeneration
The NPPF’s principle above of “promoting the vitality of our main urban areas” is an important part of
the preservation of the Green Belt. One of the five ‘purposes’ that the Green Belt serves, is “to assist
in urban regeneration, by encouraging the recycling of derelict and other urban land”. One of Britain’s
most celebrated architects, Sir Richard Rogers, in an article in the Guardian on Monday 8 September
2014, wrote that, “abandoning the Green Belt that has formed a foundation of town planning for more
than 60 years…would be an easy solution (to the housing crisis) – and also a profoundly wrong one. I
do not say this as a rural nimby, though I treasure England’s natural landscape, but as a defender of
cities. Allowing greenfield development to run riot would wreck our cities even more surely than it
would despoil the countryside”.
EHDC should think again and more creatively about building on brownfield rather than Green Belt
land. As Rogers points out, “Making brownfield sites work does not require the abandonment of all
town planning disciplines but does call for a more intelligent and design-led approach…Some sites
are less easy to build on than the blank canvas of green fields, but architects, planners and
developers need to show ingenuity in rising to this challenge rather than shrugging their shoulders”.
EHDC should embrace Rogers’ ideas about needing to regenerate our towns and cities rather than
ruining our countryside: “Suburban sprawl leads to social atomisation and fragmentation and is
environmentally disastrous, as carbon-intensive car journeys displace local shops and replace public
transport”.
Vital Landscape and Wildlife Buffers for the Park
Two sites identified by EHDC demonstrate the unsuitability of this area for housing and changes to
the Green Belt. Land North of Welwyn Road otherwise known as Archer’s Spring is Green Belt but
was proposed for outdoor sports facilities in 2001 and has since been submitted by Savill’s in
response to EHDC’s call for sites in 2012. EHDC propose 350 units on this land but the area would
stick out from the Sele part of Hertford into the Green Belt. Moreover on its northern edge there is a
band of woodland ranging from attractive mature pinewood to Ancient Hornbeam woodland
(Longwood). The spur within the site, grassy dell and intervening slopes are a County Wildlife Site
which must be protected and ecological connectivity ensured. The site has also had serious
problems of low-level contamination due to waste dumping and unstable ground. Natural chalk
collapses have occurred resulting in local subsidence. In addition commuters are unlikely to walk to
the station and so existing traffic and parking problems will arise.
Another example lies on Thieves Lane South where the proposed site for housing (250 homes) is
good agricultural land and where local people consider that this road forms the natural boundary of
Hertford’s Green Belt. If this development proceeded, the buffer to the Park would be destroyed and
the housing would be adjacent to Lady Hughes Wood, an area of Ancient woodland within the Park.
Again this represents important considerations of protection, buffering and connectivity. Housing
proposed for the Green Belt on the western edge of Panshanger Park would also be adjacent to the
ancient semi-natural woods of Birchall and Rolls/Blackthorn.
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Do Not Destroy East Herts Heritage Assets
EHDC’s current plans to declassify the Green Belt and to build around Panshanger Park at Birchall
Farm also fails to accord with The National Planning Policy Framework’s core principle to, “conserve
heritage assets in a manner appropriate to their significance”. Paragraph 129 of the NPPF states,
“Local planning authorities should identify and assess the particular significance of any heritage
asset that may be affected by a proposal including by development affecting the setting of a heritage
asset taking account of the available evidence and any necessary expertise”.
Panshanger Park is the largest and most significant of only three English Heritage listed Grade 2*
Historic Parks in the whole of East Herts. This classification indicates that the asset is of national not
just local importance. The setting of such an asset is also of vital importance. As English Heritage
itself says: “The significance of a heritage asset derives not only from its physical presence and
historic fabric but also from its setting – the surroundings in which it is experienced. The careful
management of change within the surroundings of heritage assets therefore makes an important
contribution to the quality of the places in which we live.” Do EHDC councillors really want to destroy
one of their oldest heritage assets and its setting in an act of development vandalism?
The oldest part of the current estate is at the extreme west of the park. Birchall Farm (or Birchholt as it
was then called) was even owned by Elizabeth I who in 1599 granted it to Henry Best and Robert
Holland. This part of the western end of the current estate housed the original mansion called
Fitzjohns which was later knocked down and replaced by Cole Green House, a seven-bay mansion
built for William Cowper, first Earl Cowper (first Lord Chancellor of Great Britain, 1707-10, again 171418; he died at Cole Green in 1723).
The estate in that era extended into and over a large part of the current Birchall Farm on which EHDC
are planning to allow development. By 1738 the park surrounding Cole Green House had been
extended to roughly 50 hectares as far as Birchall Wood (still standing midway between the current
eastern edge of Welwyn Garden City and the western edge of Panshanger Park and classified as
Ancient Woodland). This extension included 86 acres of what formerly was Birchall Farm; this
included a semicircular shrubbery next to Birchall wood and also numerous fruit and flower gardens.
This historical asset would be destroyed by allowing development on what was then an important part
of the estate.
The renowned landscape architect, Capability Brown was invited to “improve” the grounds which
include this western end of the current estate by “beautifying” them. He received payments from 1755
to 1764 totalling £618 7s. 6d. (Hugh Prince: The Changing Landscape of Panshanger). Again, all of
this was on what included the current Birchall Farm which EHDC are now targeting for development.
In 2016 the rest of the country will be celebrating the tercentenary of Capability Brown’s birth with
activities and shows while East Hertfordshire will be giving the go-ahead to destroy some of his
legacy. The area is steeped in history and EHDC has a duty to preserve the local authority’s historical
assets, as set out in the NPPF Chapters 12 and Plan-making, where enhancement of heritage
assets, where possible is the aim, not loss of setting and therefore signficance
In Achieving Sustainable Development, the NPPF states that planning policies and decisions should,
inter alia, identify and protect areas of tranquility which have remained relatively undisturbed by noise
and are prized for their recreational and amenity value for this reason. This impacts on the quality of
life and of health as in para 123.
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“Green Belt is not always being given sufficient protection” Minister Brandon Lewis
When EHDC notifies the Secretary of State (as it has been required to do since May 2013) of its
proposal to declassify the Green Belt around Panshanger Park, it will find it impossible to
demonstrate, as it must, “exceptional circumstances” to permit that declassification.
Its Draft District Plan cites “unmet housing needs from villages in the west of the East Herts area” and
also “to meet long-term housing needs …east of Welwyn Garden City” as reasons for its proposals to
declassify the Green belt to the west of Panshanger Park and to develop that land.
However, the single issue of unmet demand is not sufficient to allow such developments on Green
Belt land as evidenced by one of the most recent announcements by the Government. Local
Government Minister Brandon Lewis, stated on 1 July 2013 that, “Having considered recent planning
decisions by councils and the Planning Inspectorate, it has become apparent that, in some cases, the
Green Belt is not always being given the sufficient protection that was the explicit policy intent of
ministers. The Secretary of State wishes to make clear that, in considering planning applications,
although each case will depend on its facts, he considers that the single issue of unmet demand,
whether for traveller sites or for conventional housing, is unlikely to outweigh harm to the Green Belt
and other harm to constitute the ‘very special circumstances’ justifying inappropriate development in
the Green Belt”.
We note the concern of CPRE about the risk of loss of Green Belt land in Hertfordshire and their
indication that they are willing to challenge this and could possibly take legal action. The Friends of
Panshanger Park therefore call on EHDC to withdraw its proposals to declassify as Green Belt the
important buffer areas around Panshanger Park and not incur an expensive rejection of its plans.
The Committee, Friends of Panshanger Park
6th January 2015
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