PLANS to build dozens of new homes in Barrow have been turned down as the council says the scheme appears ‘tightly packed and cramped’.

Westmorland and Furness Council has refused a planning application from Mulberry Homes to construct 38 new homes on ‘open fields’ north of Sherbourne Avenue.

A decision notice issued by the council says the proposals do not deliver ‘high quality’ design required by the local plan.

It states: “It appears tightly packed and cramped, utilises standard dwelling types, with inadequate dysfunctional parking arrangements, a lack of useable public open space which benefits from surveillance, including play space, and it would fail to compliment the adjacent rural landscape and green wedge.

“The result is a scheme which appears to be based on quantity rather than quality or good urban design principles, and lacking assimilation into the context of the area.”

The decision notice added there was a ‘lack of visitor parking’, the proposed development does not ‘convincingly demonstrate’ a net gain in biodiversity and there is ‘no evidence’ the proposed affordable homes meet the needs of a registered provider or the local need.

According to planning documents, the proposed housing development would consist of a range of two to five-bedroomed properties with four ‘affordable’ homes.

The planning statement says: “The proposed design will attempt to create a more modern spacious private housing estate than that already established on the first two phases of the site.

“The views will be open to all aspects around the site, and at the northern edge of the site a clear opening can be seen through to the open green area beyond the boundary, and the privacy distances will be in compliance with the Local Authorities privacy distances.”

A previous outline planning application for a housing development on the same site was approved but the date to submit reserved matters has now expired.

The design and access statement adds: “This site is readily available and deliverable and would sit seamlessly into the surrounding area and would merely become an extension of what is already there whilst providing infill between the existing site already built out and Yarlside Road District, and within the settlement boundary of Barrow, whilst later having the benefit of sustainable development.

“Developments such as these will provide much needed growth for the community as well as a district, whilst forming much needed housing for local families.”

The planning application was refused on June 7.