Warehouse with offices at Land to the South of A365 Bath Road and West of Turnpike Garage, Melksham

“In summary, the application proposal seeks outline planning permission, with all matters being reserved for a later application pursuant to the proposed construction of a warehouse with office space, parking and associated landscaping including site access.”

“A commercial warehouse, under B8 use, with a floor area of approximately 21,000 square metres. • The proposed building is indicatively represented as being 188m long and between 109m and 121m deep. 16m high at the eaves, rising to 17.5m at the apexes. • 100 indicatively planned parking spaces would be provided. • An external loading area would be provided for approximately 20 HGVs.”

“The site is in the open countryside and is agricultural land, with the A365 to the north and residential properties and gardens to the south, south-west and north-west.”

“The neighbouring houses, as shown below, are two storey properties that do not appear as significant visual intrusions in the prevailing landscape when viewed from the open agricultural land with boundary hedging and trees.”

“This application was deferred at the 1 July 2025, Strategic Planning Committee meeting to allow the applicant additional time to address the lack of information reasons for refusal that were being recommended by officers pursuant to ecology, noise and drainage matters.”

“For completeness, the recommended reasons to refuse the application in July 2025 are set out below.”

“In summary, while the submitted ecology information has resulted in the technical ecology objection being removed, the strong concerns about the principle of developing this site for a warehouse remains. Furthermore, the economic and other benefits (including the further information submitted by the applicant) do not outweigh the strong policy conflict.”

“The development would be contrary to the adopted Wiltshire Core Strategy and would result in harmful landscape impacts and detrimentally affect the setting of a nearby heritage asset (listed building). The applicant has not satisfactorily evidenced that the proposed development would be suitably mitigated in terms of drainage and noise impacts, and officers maintain the proposal would harm nearby residential amenities.”

“An Appropriate Assessment has been completed favourably for this site and proposal following the submission and review of additional information. No ecology-based objection is raised subject to the applicant entering into a legal agreement to secure the Biodiversity Net Gain (BNG) monitoring fee of £11,165.00 and recommended planning conditions.”

“A number of questions were asked about planning policy given the recent n ew s that the emerging Local Plan was likely to be recommended for non-adoption by inspectors. It was reiterated by officers that the core policies in the exiting Local Plan, which was adopted in 2015, remained integral to decision making. Members noted that the NPPF gave greater weight to the importance of employment than had been included in the emerging Local Plan.”

“Members expressed sympathy for the impact that the proposed development would have on the residential amenity of neighbouring properties, particularly those to the south west of the site. They stated that they would welcome carefu l consideration by the applicant about what more could be done to mitigate the impact on neighbouring properties at reserved matters stage if outline permission was granted.”

“At the conclusion of the technical questions, the Chairman, seconded by Cllr Nick Baker, proposed that the application be refused for the reasons outlined i n the report.”

“Officers advised members that if they resolved to approve the application, it would be required to be referred to the Secretary of State as part of the legal notification provisions. A legal agreement would also be required to secure the necessary ecology Biodiversity Net Gain monitoring fee of £11,165, which would need to be secured prior to any commencement of development.”

“A motion to notify the Secretary of State for Housing Communities and Local Government that the Committee was minded to grant the application, subject to appropriate conditions and a Section 106 agreement, was then moved by the Chairman and seconded by Cllr Chris Brautigam. It was taken by assent of the Committee that the wording of the conditions would be delegated to the Head of Development Management and Senior Planning Officer in consultation with th e Chairman.”