Second knock-back for care home companies as another Market Drayton plan is thrown out by inspectors

The rejection of LNT Care Developments' plan for a care home at Sych Farm comes hot on the heels of Whitehall rejecting a different company's scheme in at the Phoenix Garage site in Great Hales Street.

LNT had wanted to turn Sych Farm into a 66-bed care home. It would have created about 48 jobs.

At a planning appeal hearing last year the company's representative had claimed it would be “like a four-star hotel”.

Planning inspector Michael Cryan in his decision said the "appeal site is essentially a hostile one for pedestrians and cyclists" and people would drive to the care home by car.

"My visit was carried out on what was clearly a busy auction day at the nearby livestock market, and numerous vehicles were parked or manoeuvring on Western Way and Burnside Road between the appeal site entrance and the Gingerbread Man public house.

"In places, the parking was obstructing the footway. There were also other lorries and commercial vehicles passing along Western Way, and that road would be likely to become even busier still at such time as the remaining parts of the designated employment land it serves are developed.

"In my view, the highway environment around the appeal site is essentially a hostile one for pedestrians and cyclists."

Mr Cryan also said that the proposal would result in the loss of designated employment land which has not been adequately justified.

He added that its loss "could therefore significantly undermine the strategy for future economic growth in Shropshire."

He added that "noise impacts would mean that future occupiers would not have acceptable living conditions."

Sych Farm is also a heritage asset of "moderate and local significance."

"As the proposal would involve the complete demolition of the farm buildings, it would mean the total loss of an Non Designated Heritage Asset; the scale of harm to that asset would therefore be substantial.

The inspector wrote: "The development of Sych Farm as a model farm took place during the “high farming” period between 1840 and 1870, when farming and farmstead planning advanced to reflect the increased availability of commercial feeds and fertilisers."

An association with the noted Shropshire Corbet family, he said, "is of limited interest or significance outside the locality".

The Planning Inspectorate has also recently rejected another developer's appeal to get planning permission for a 60-bed care home.

Frontier Estates had appealed to the Planning Inspectorate after Shropshire Council refused its scheme for the former Phoenix Garage site in Great Hales Street, Market Drayton.