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19
Oct
‘We’ve had our fair share of housing… Killinghall can’t cope with more,” say villagers
One by one they troop out of Killinghall village hall and shake their heads.
“How will the school cope?” “The roads are already congested.” “Our GP surgery recently closed, where will we go to see a doctor?”
They’ve been to Bellway’s drop-in community consultation event about plans for 120 homes off Ripon Road.
It’s one of four potential Killinghall housing developments announced in the space of four months that could lead to 425 homes — increasing the population of the rapidly growing village by another 1,000.
Ther appears to be little enthusiasm for the schemes — but can they be resisted?
Two residents are standing firm. Former parish councillor Mike Wilkinson and Libby Ben Abdessadak greeted residents outside the village hall on Wednesday (October 15) with a petition calling for no new homes in Killinghall. Most people were only too willing to sign.
Their petition, which can also be signed online, now has well over the 500 names required to be debated by North Yorkshire Council’s Harrogate and Knaresborough area committee.
Ms Ben Abdessadak says:
I’ve lived in Killinghall for 25 years and we have had our fair share. There must have been 1,000 homes already built in the last few years. The traffic is horrendous — they still haven’t sorted out the problems outside the new Tesco where schoolchildren use a bus stop. Elderly people can’t cross the roads to use buses. We are fed-up with it.
Mike Wilkinson and Libby Ben Abdessadak with their petition outside the drop-in event.
A bypass, she says, would soften the blow. A Killinghall bypass has been much talked about but while that never gets approved, new housing developments frequently do.
Yet Killinghall has lost two pubs as well as a health centre in recent years. Community facilities are scarce.
Mr Wilkinson, whose neighbour was seriously injured crossing Ripon Road a couple of years ago, says traffic is the main problem but also highlights issues such as pollution and loss of green space.
Residents browse the information boards.
'We aren't building enough homes'
The walls of the village hall hosting the consultation event are lined with bygone photos of Killinghall. One shows the junction of Ripley Road and Otley Road — the cause of so much angst today. There’s not a single vehicle in view.
Bellway display boards show the main access route to the proposed site would be opposite the war memorial on Ripon Road, protected trees would be retained, most homes would have three-to-five bedrooms. But no formal planning application has been submitted yet and the details are light.
Martyn Earle at the drop-in event.
Martyn Earle, a strategic land director at Bellway, says Killinghall’s proximity to Harrogate makes it popular with buyers and there is an unmet need for housing. One couple, he says, turned up to ask if they could put down their names for the development.
A former planning case officer at North Tyneside Council, Mr Earle is aware that North Yorkshire Council’s lack of a local plan demonstrating a five-year housing supply makes it more difficult for it to reject housing schemes.
Asked to respond to villagers’ concerns, he says he understands their worries but it’s too early to talk about mitigation measures. If an application is submitted and approved, Bellway and North Yorkshire Council would be obliged to come up with a Section 106 legal agreement detailing developer contributions for areas such as education and health.
Residents, however, are sceptical and question what the village has to show for previous Section 106 agreements associated with recent mass housebuilding.
Mr Earle says ultimately, it’s up to developers to put forward proposals and councils to decide whether they conform with planning rules. He adds: “We just aren’t building enough homes for the communities that exist, hence the national policy is build, build, build.”
Killinghall residents at the notorious Ripon Road and Otley Road junction.
‘Undemocratic’
Killinghall is far from unique: on Friday we reported similar concerns from villagers in Langthorpe, Kirby Hill and Milby, near Boroughbridge, where 487 homes are in the pipeline.
Councillor Michael Harrison, a Conservative who represents Killinghall on North Yorkshire Council, has been conducting a survey of residents’ views on the glut of housing proposals.
He says none of the four proposed Killinghall sites was in the Harrogate district local plan 2014-35, which applied until Harrogate Borough Council was abolished in 2023.
Cllr Harrison said having a local plan with at least a five-year housing supply “makes it relatively easy for councils to resist development proposals outside of their local plan”. But the new North Yorkshire Council is drawing up a fresh countywide local plan, which is likely to take years.
He says Labour’s plans to more than double the county’s housing target “significantly weakens the council’s ability to control development in a plan-led manner”, adding:
I believe this to be undemocratic and is an attempt by government to overturn locally determined development plans. That said, whilst the council has no choice but to determine applications in accordance with these principles, if the adverse impacts are so great that they outweigh the benefits of providing the housing then applications can be refused.
The Killinghall campaigners may face an uphill battle trying to prove the “adverse impacts” — but they are determined to try.
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