Home Farm

Persimmon Mark I - 370 houses, community hall, school playing field, access to Church Walk has been stalled for a couple of years. After nearly a decade of planning just two show houses have been built.

Now Persimmon Mark II has been unveiled. There is some reduction in housing, the community hall is parked near the Court Road playing area, the school field is gone and there is no access via Church Walk. Company reps presented the new scheme to a parish council meeting last night with strong public attendance.

Persimmon have been forced into this because they cannot agree terms with one of the landowners on Home Farm(Denison) and therefore cannot deliver their planning obligations (access to Court Road via Church Walk). But Paul Stone of Persimmon insisted they were not trying to evade any obligations.

There was a mood of scepticism because the company presented the changes as beneficial rather than unavoidable. For instance, the original proposed access to the village via Church Walk was described as ‘not ideal’. Access via Court Road (near JR Trolleys) however would be better overlooked and have ‘clear benefits’.

But Parish Council chair Delise Ball was worried that they were creating a ‘housing island’ separate from the village.  And Parish Councillor Alan Morris reminded Persimmon reps that the Recreation Ground was not an option for finding school land elsewhere.

The community stands to lose out on the ‘section 106’ resources that come with planning permission. This is partly because the number of houses will drop but also because the formula for calculating it has changed since the first planning permission in 2005.

This development has come back to haunt Central Beds, the successor authority of the old Mid Beds council.  Mid Beds councillors perversely switched their support from the university site (backed by an inquiry report and supported by villagers) to Home Farm precisely because of the Church Walk access and the ‘integration to the village’ that this provided.  This is what Persimmon cannot now deliver.

Persimmon say they will probably submit an application in the new year which could be both outline and detailed. They also say they will mount an exhibition of their plans in the village before Christmas.