Screening Opinion - Court Farm, King George VI Avenue, Hove

Applicant

Aldi Stores Ltd

Agent

Planning Potential Ltd

Date Received

Application BH2021/03511 submitted 30/9/21

Site

Court Farm, King George VI Avenue, Hove

Proposal

Demolition of existing buildings on site and erection of retail unit (Class E) of 1895sqm with associated works including new access, car parking (120 spaces) and landscaping.

This Screening Opinion seeks to establish whether, given the characteristics of the proposed development, its location and its potential impact, the proposal would potentially give rise to significant environmental effects. Thus requires Environmental Impact Assessment as set out in the Town and Country Planning (Environmental Impact Assessment) Regulations 2017 (‘the EIA Regulations’).

The proposal does not comprise Schedule 1 development, as defined in the EIA Regulations where EIA is required in every case.

The application site is not located within a ‘sensitive area’, as defined in regulation 2(1) of the EIA Regulations, although it is within the setting of one (the South Downs National Park).

The site (including the larger Toads Hole Valley adjacent) lies within a Groundwater Source Protection Zone (majority zone 2 and north western corner within zone 3). The site also contains ecological habitats and some protected species such as reptiles and dormice.

The development would not fall within Schedule 2, Part 10 (b) ‘urban development projects’ as set out in the EIA Regulations, as the site area is 0.97 hectares, just under the 1 hectare threshold.

For ‘Urban Development Projects’, the thresholds are listed as follows:

• a development which includes more than 1 hectare of urban development which is not dwellinghouse development
• a development which includes more than 150 dwellings
• the overall area of the development exceeds 5 hectares

The National Planning Practice Guidance advises that projects which are wholly outside sensitive areas and do not exceed the screening thresholds are not Schedule 2 development and should not be screened by the local planning authority.

The Court Farm (CF) site area is however very close to the 1 hectare threshold and in addition CF immediately adjoins a site (Toads Hole Valley) which is currently the subject of a planning application for substantial development, and therefore it is considered appropriate to assess the matter further in the context of the EIA Regulations.

It is appropriate to evaluate the scheme against the indicative criteria and thresholds in Column 2 of Schedule 2, Part 10 (b) and also to assess whether Court Farm forms part of one larger ‘project’ that is the wider Toads Hole Valley site, or is a distinct stand-alone project, together with an assessment of potential cumulative impacts.

Column 2 aids assessment as it provides indicative exclusion thresholds and criteria where Schedule 2 development is unlikely to require EIA, notably where proposals would not be on a significantly greater scale than the previous use, or the types of impact are not of a markedly different nature or where there are not high levels of contamination.

The Court Farm site has been partially developed in the past (with farm buildings and a farmhouse) however the majority of it is a field and shrubbery/trees, and is thus not deemed to be fully ‘previously developed’.

Proposed re-development to a supermarket and car parking would be a markedly different land use. Parts of the site may have some contamination from previous farm uses but this is not likely to be significant.

Column 2 goes on to state that EIA is unlikely to be required for sites which have not previously been intensively developed unless:

• area of the scheme is more than 5 hectares
• it would provide a total of more than 10,000 m2 of new commercial floorspace
• the development would have significant urbanising effects in a previously non-urbanised area, for example a new development of more than 1,000 dwellings

The Court Farm site and proposed development would not be close to any of the above indicative thresholds, so in this regard it is unlikely to give rise to significant environmental effects.

If it were, however, to be considered cumulatively with the remainder of Toads Hole Valley (THV), as a single project, the development as a whole would fall within Part 10(b) of Schedule 2 and would exceed the thresholds in Column 2.

The THV development is a development which is currently at the live application stage, it is EIA development, it is likely to come forward at the same time as the Court Farm proposal. THV involves a mixed used development of up to 880 dwellings, 25,000sqm of office floorspace, land for a secondary school and the site area is 42.2ha.

Key considerations are, therefore, whether Court Farm (CF) may be considered a stand-alone project in terms of the EIA Regulations, and whether the CF project would be considered to have significant environmental effects when considered cumulatively with THV.

Government guidance states that each application (or request for a screening opinion) should be considered on its own merits. It also states that there are occasions however when other existing or approved development may be relevant in determining whether significant effects are likely as a consequence of a proposed development.

It advises that local planning authorities should always have regard to the possible cumulative effects arising from any existing or approved development. The guidance states that an application should not be considered in isolation if, in reality, it is an integral part of a more substantial development.

THV is not an ‘existing’ or ‘approved’ development at this stage therefore it does not strictly need to be considered. However, it is an application that is significantly advanced. Therefore, notwithstanding this and the fact the CF development is not Schedule 2 development, the impacts have been assessed further below.

The site forms the north-east corner of a much larger site known as Toads Hole Valley. There is a current application (ref BH2018/03633) for a substantial mixed-use development including up to 880 dwellings, 25,000sqm of office floorspace, land for a secondary school, open space and associated works. The THV site area is 42.2ha, so the site areas when combined would be 43.17ha

Where an application relates to a small project below the thresholds in Schedule 2 of the Regulations, the fact that some time in the future the small project will form part of a larger development does not mean that the cumulative effects of the larger project have to be considered as part of the current scheme.

The assessment of whether an application relates to a Schedule 2 application or not is to be decided by reference to the application for development consent applied for and not any development contemplated beyond that.

Whilst the two sites do form part of one strategic development allocation in the Brighton and Hove City Plan Part One (policy DA7), Court Farm is recognised separately to the main THV site within that policy (even though DA7 applies to both), and was formerly a farm site which has been partly previously developed, which THV has not. The CF scheme has a distinct land use which is not a continuation of the new THV neighbourhood proposal and the sites can be developed totally independently of each other.

The schemes are in different land ownership with different applicants and are for different types of land use, and the proposals are not connected or interdependent on each other in terms of key infrastructure or in terms of new residents as customers.

It is considered that the CF scheme cannot properly be regarded as an ‘integral’ part of an inevitably more substantial development project. It is not a piecemeal part of a single project and is stand alone. There is no question of the developer seeking to avoid or circumvent EIA by splitting up a larger single ‘project’.

The THV scheme is likely to come forward at the same time as the Court Farm proposal therefore there will be a degree of cumulative impact. There is no doubt that the environmental effects of both schemes will overlap, notably with regard to transport, air quality, noise and ecology. There is also no doubt the THV scheme is EIA development and indeed it is accompanied by an Environmental Statement.

The fact THV is an EIA scheme does not however automatically mean that any adjacent schemes will also require EIA. CF will develop a largely greenfield site and result in a markedly different land use, but it is not a ‘sensitive’ site and is not considered to result in any unusual, exceptional or particularly significant environmental impacts (in the context of the EIA Regulations).

The development will affect biodiversity and use natural resources given it is largely undeveloped and will result in additional traffic generation (and air pollution and noise), however, given the limited scale of the CF scheme it is unlikely to give rise to significant environmental effects in its own right, particularly with the imposition of standard conditions.

The site is not close to an Air Quality Management Area. CF should not add significant cumulative impacts with the THV scheme during the construction phase, given its scale. Whilst the adjacent THV scheme could give rise to significant environmental effects these are not added to such an extent to warrant EIA for the CF scheme, particularly given it is not Schedule 2 development.

For the reasons outlined above, the Court Farm proposal has been considered as a single, independent project. The proposal is not located in a defined sensitive area and does not constitute Schedule 2 development where Screening is necessary within the EIA Regulations.

The cumulative impact with the adjacent Toads Hole Valley scheme has been considered notwithstanding that THV is not an existing or approved scheme and, whilst impacts will overlap, that does not warrant EIA for the Court Farm scheme given its scale, location and likely impacts.

In the opinion of the Local Planning Authority, the development would not require an Environmental Impact Assessment.

Signed

MS, Maria Seale Jane Moseley, Team Leader - Major Applications, 20/10/21

Reviewed by

Jane Moseley, Planning Manager,20/10/21