stouravonmagazine.co.uk
60 New Stour & Avon, May 6, 2022
Property
Property
Grants available to act on phosphorus reduction
Hot on the heels of BPS applications, a range of grants are available to farmers and land managers within the River Stour catchment who adopt practices that reduce phosphorus inputs to farmland in the Middle Stour and Blackmore Vale areas. Designed to prevent soil erosion and buffer watercourses from run-off, the grants can be used for: • Growing cover crops after maize • Under sowing grass into maize • Growing cover crops after combinable crops • Fencing to exclude livestock from watercourses • Establishing new or wider buffer strips • Arable reversion to zero-input grass • Arable reversion to low/mediuminput grass • Arable reversion to three-year legume fallow Additionally, within a slightly wider area, farmers and land managers can submit expressions of interest for funding to:
• Create leaky ponds • Construct farm wetlands to treat field run-off and ditch/drain flow • Establish new hedgerows • Plant trees and establish small-scale woodland Will Cairns, Graduate Surveyor in
Symonds & Sampson’s Sturminster Newton office can provide further information on the funding criteria ahead of a closing date for applications on May 23, 2022. Contact him on 01258 472244 or at wcairns@symondsandsampson.co.uk.
West Moors plan for 80-bed care home by Nicci Brown An 80-bed care home and church could be built on land off Blackfield Lane, West Moors, for which an environmental impact screening opinion has been sought on behalf of Mr Nick Aris. The 1.9 hectare site in the north-eastern part of West Moors is currently uncultivated land which once formed part of Blackfield Farm, bounded to the north and east by heathland and to the west by residential development. To the south is the Castleman Trailway, the long-distance walking, cycling and horseriding route follow the former Southampton to Dorchester railway line. Vehicular and pedestrian access to the site is via
Blackfield Lane to the west. Blackfield Lane serves residential properties and leads on to The Avenue which in turn junctions with Station Road to the west. The site has been the subject of two previous planning applications for development across the whole of the site, the first including light industrial floorspace, a community hall, church and 60-bed residential care home. It was withdrawn and followed by a similar application with less light industrial, but it was refused planning permission on the grounds of traffic impact, the scale of development and the potential adverse effect on the adjoining internationally designated sites. Clare Bartlett of agent Batcheller Monkhouse for
the applicant say the proposed development has been scaled back from the previous two proposals to use on 1.06 hectares of the total site. “The scheme which is the subject of this Screening request relates to the erection of a 115sqm church, 4,150sqm care home, associated car parking and a biodiversity enhancement area,” she says. “The commercial building has been removed from the proposal in order to address concerns regarding traffic generation and overdevelopment of the site. “This has also allowed for nearly half of the site to be left undeveloped, to be retained as biodiversity land.” She added that access will
remain as per existing, via Blackfield Lane, which does not form part of the adopted highway, and the access point will be upgraded. Impacts on protected species identified as being present at the site (reptiles and bats) will be avoided by retaining a buffer at the east boundary of the site, in combination with the retained habitat at the north of the site and precautionary working methods during construction. Green infrastructure will be provided throughout the built area (including grass-crete parking spaces and provision of additional nectar resources for invertebrates). Comments on the application P/ESC/2022/02568 are open until May 19 on the Dorset Council website.
