PLANS to build 103 homes on the outskirts of a former pit village breach planning policies, councillors will be told next week.

Durham County Council’s central and east area planning committee will be recommended on Tuesday (December 9) to refuse permission for an outline scheme at Coxhoe.

The Hellens Group wants to build the homes – 40 of them would be designated affordable - on land east of Prospect Place, Commercial Road East.

But planning officials are concerned that the site is outside the village settlement and to allow it would reach county planning policies.

Part of the site, a former limeworks, is in the Coxhoe Ponds Local Wildlife Site.The developer is planning to build bungalows and terraced, semi-detached and detached houses, for which detailed planning permission would also have to be granted.

Coxhoe Parish Council has objected to the scheme, branding it unsustainable.

It says: “Development would result in the unacceptable intrusion of built development into the open countryside, detrimentally affecting the appearance of the setting of the area, a large rural village.”

The firm says in a statement supporting the application: “The scheme will deliver much needed affordable housing, which represents 40 per cent of the housing proposed.”,

Ann Rawlinson, Senior Planning Officer

Says in a report to the committee that the proposal “would represent a

Significant, inappropriate incursion into the open countryside,”

She adds that it would adversely impact on the visual and landscape character

of the area and that there would be an “unacceptable, adverse impact upon the nature conservation interest of the area, including species protected by law that cannot be satisfactorily mitigated against or

compensated for.”