Appeal halves ‘triangle field’ tree protection

Several planning applications have been rejected for the development of a number of houses on La Pointe. An order was made in October 2019 to protect 46 trees.

A tribunal appeal hearing into the order was held last month and the decision states that the appeal has been allowed in part, in reference to the order not being in the interests of amenity. However, the order continues to stand for 23 of the trees.

In the tribunal’s decision, presiding member Stuart Fell agreed that many of the trees played a significant role in softening the appearance of a heavily developed urban area. However, not all were suitable for the order.

‘While the inclusion of many of the trees in the order is warranted on amenity grounds, the case for the inclusion of many of the other trees is inadequate,’ he said.

‘Our overall conclusion in this appeal is that as we have not been satisfied on the ground that the decision to confirm the order was ultra vires or otherwise unreasonable, and we are satisfied that it is in the interest of amenity that many of the trees should be protected.’

Representatives from the Development & Planning Authority, who put the order in place, and the appellant, Hillstone Guernsey Ltd, who bought the land in 2018 for £420,000, had attended the appeal, with both sides putting forward their case over whether the order reasonable.

Questions over a number of shortcomings were raised, including the advice for TPOs, approved by the DPA in 2009, not being followed, as well as an incomplete and incorrect method of assessing the trees for a TPO in Guernsey.

The appellant’s team said they had bought the land and progressed with a scheme they thought had been acceptable.

Three proposals have been rejected so far – for eight houses, then a scaled-back six-house scheme and, most recently, for two houses on the triangular field, which is opposite the entrance to the Braye Road Industrial Estate.

• A further planning appeal on the rejection of the six-house application is due to take place at 12.15pm at St Pierre Park Hotel today.

Planning's failings over tree order to be reviewed

AN URGENT and critical review of the Planning Department will take place after serious failings in the way in which a tree protection order was imposed at La Pointe following fears that developers would ‘get the chainsaws out’.

Last month’s independent tribunal against the order heard from the developer who wants to build housing on the site, as well as the Development & Planning Authority.

Stuart Fell presided over the appeal in which he considered the reasonable nature or otherwise of the order and pointed to several areas where the DPA had been found wanting.

This included the lack of pre-application advice on the importance of the trees.

Housing development plans for the Vale ‘triangle field’ along Braye Road were rebuffed by the DPA before the order was placed.

An email to procure one by the States’ principal conservation and design officer, Alun White, saw a rash use of words over the felling of trees.

It read: ‘La Pointe is a priority – ASAP please. There’s a planning application under conservation (FULL/2018/2602), which has a number of buildings in very close proximity to the trees although they claim the development will not negatively affect the trees. I wouldn’t be surprised if the developer get the chain saws out.’

The order was not activated until 29 October 2019, an interlude of eight months since the assessment had been undertaken.

During this period, a planning application for eight houses had been refused and a second application for six houses had been made following pre-application advice.

A further criticism was that, after a half-hour site visit, the conclusion to impose an area TPO was incorrect and should have been for a group TPO, as confirmed at the hearing, for the whole line of trees, similar to those classified in earlier orders.

‘The need for a close examination of each tree was necessary in this case and that a decision to recommend an order based on an average estimation of quality, condition and longevity is simply inadequate,’ Mr Fell added.

In addition, approved guidance designed to inform the entire tree protection order assessment and designation process was missing.

‘Detailed guidance had been prepared, consulted on and approved by the former Environment Board in 2009 but was subsequently overlooked,’ he said.

‘It became clear at the hearing that the survey and decision assessment pro-forma used by Mr [Andy] McCutcheon [the States arboriculturalist and the authority’s expert consultant on tree matters] was a document formulated many years earlier in a UK planning authority and had never been formally considered, consulted on or approved by a board or committee of the authority.

‘This fundamental breakdown in the validation of the guidance framework relating to TPO designation is a serious matter.’

The decision was to keep the order for 23 of the trees, half of those it was imposed on originally, while the DPA agreed that its department required an urgent and critical review and more robust procedures to put in place.

The authority confirmed it would be a priority.