Buckley town centre flats above Mold Road shop refused by Flintshire planners
Plans to build six flats above an existing shop in Buckley town centre have been refused by Flintshire County Council.
The application related to 1-3 Mold Road, on the junction with Padeswood Road, where the existing premises operate as an estate agency.
The proposal was for a two-storey extension above the shop, providing six new apartments and associated development.
Flintshire County Council issued the refusal, citing two reasons.
The first relates to the River Dee Special Area of Conservation (SAC), one of the highest levels of habitat protection under UK law.
The Buckley site sits within the catchment of the river, meaning rainwater and wastewater from the area eventually flow into it.
The council said it could not satisfy itself that the new development would not add to phosphate pollution in the SAC, given that Natural Resources Wales is still carrying out a review into whether the river is failing its conservation targets on phosphates.
Without that information, the council said it had to apply the precautionary principle, refusing rather than risking damage to the protected site.
The relevant local plan policy is Policy EN6 of the Flintshire Local Development Plan, which protects designated sites such as the River Dee SAC.
The second reason for refusal was the absence of a Green Infrastructure Statement, a document setting out how a development will protect or enhance trees, plants, water features and the green and blue spaces around it.
Policy PC3 of the Flintshire Local Development Plan requires applications to demonstrate a net benefit for biodiversity, and the council said the Buckley application had not done so.
The application was made in the name of JH Build to Rent Ltd, registered in Manchester, with NJPlanning Ltd of St Asaph acting as agent.
The applicant has six months from the date of refusal to appeal to Planning Environment Decisions Wales, the body that handles planning appeals in Wales.
The Sustainability Statement submitted with the application focused on transport and parking, arguing that the town centre location, with bus stops within 50 to 100 metres on Mold Road and Buckley Railway Station around 900 metres away, justified the absence of off-street parking.
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