Plans for the construction of 30 homes on Green Belt land have been refused by St Albans City & District Council.
The development would have been completed on land off Orchard Drive, in the village of Park Street, prior to the refusal of its planning application on Wednesday (November 15).
The site would have covered 1.35 hectares, adjacent to homes in Chiswell Green.
Access to a number of properties included within the plans was given as a reason for the plan's refusal, with highway safety and "inadequate visibility" cited.
A report written by St Albans City & District Council planning officer Ellie Dilks explains the reason for the application's refusal: "The benefits were considered to include the provision of housing, self-build housing and affordable housing, and the commitment to 10 per cent biodiversity net gain.
"These other considerations outweighed the harm to the Green Belt in this particular case...
"...Under this reserved matters application, whilst there are no objections to existing and future occupants amenity, landscape and design there are technical Highway objections.
"The access serving Plot 1-13 is unsatisfactory to serve the proposed development, this would likely give rise to conditions detrimental to highway safety contrary to Hertfordshire Transport policy LTP4 (2018) and Policy 34 of the St Albans Local Plan Review 1994.
"The accesses serving Plot 5 and 25 are unsatisfactory due to inadequate visibility, this will result in vehicles from these accesses coming into conflict with other highway users."
The application was originally submitted by Abbey Development Ltd in November 2022, and has since received over 20 public comments and objections.
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One of these objections, written by a resident of Orchard Drive, read: "We wish to strongly oppose this development.
"This is Green Belt land and shouldn’t be built upon.
"The road is far too narrow to cope with the additional traffic.
"It will be a nightmare to live here whilst the development is being built, with all the vans and lorries who will have no consideration for the existing residents."
The plans can be viewed by using reference 5/2022/2747 on the St Albans City & District Council planning portal: www.stalbans.gov.uk/view-and-track-planning-applications
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