RESIDENTS living in the Mill Lane and Omega Park area of Alton are up in arms following the revelation of plans that, if granted, would allow HGVs to service a waste transfer facility at Waterbrook Road on a 24/7 basis.

The application, by Hutchings and Carter (H&C), part of the Waltet Group, is for the variation of a condition of planning to enable an extension of operational hours to 24 hours, seven days a week, for HGV movements and associated shovel loading of road planings (aggregate).

Located at Unit 7 on the Waterbrook Estate, the site, which backs onto Hampshire County Council’s household waste recycling centre on Omega Park, has clearly defined operational hours, agreed upon “in the interests of local amenity in accordance with Policy 10 (protecting public health, safety and amenity)”.

They are set out in Condition 5, agreed by the county council as part of planning permission granted for the site in September 2016, stating that: “No heavy goods vehicles shall enter or leave the site and no plant or machinery shall be operated except between the following hours: 7am-6pm Monday to Saturday. There shall be no working on Sundays or recognised public holidays.”

This latest application, lodged with the county council on January 5 is to amend Condition 5 to lift the restriction on HGV movement to and from the site, and to allow a shovel to operate outside the designated working period, so loading can continue round the clock.

According to Wilsom Road resident Rachel Palmer, the proposed change to operating hours came to the attention of the wider community when the owner of a business premises adjacent to the H&C recycling site was notified of the application.

Even though these operational changes would result in non-stop HGV movement throughout the night and on Sundays, and noise from the shovel as it loads the planings onto the trucks, there had been no consideration given, says Mrs Palmer, to informing residents who fear that, if granted, the proposal could have a detrimental impact on their quality of life.

When challenged, a planner confirmed that the authority was only required to notify people/premises of planning applications within a 100m radius of the site.

Mrs Palmer believes the main impact will be from the noise of HGVs using Wilsom Road and Mill Lane as well as from the loading process, and that this could be “the thin end of the wedge and set a precedent for other businesses wanting to operate 24/7”.

Spitalhatch resident Judith Wright said the noise during daytime hours of large tipper-style trucks “driving very fast along Mill Lane” shakes her flat.

“They bang and crash along the road and I can also hear them on the site from my bedroom window,” she said.

“I love living in Spitalhatch but I do suffer, not just from the noise of the trucks but sometimes from the tip behind me.”

And she added: “To have these trucks thundering along the road 24 hours a day, 365 days a year, we will have no respite. It is bad enough now (in the winter) but in the summer, with the windows open the noise and the dust, both from the trucks and the site, will be unbearable.”

But a noise impact assessment, carried out on behalf of Waltet Ltd, concludes that the noise associated with the additional daytime activity on the site would have a “low impact” at all of the residential properties assessed (among them those in Waterbrook Road, Spitalhatch, Wilsom Road and Golden Chair Cottage), and that “no observed effect on health or quality of life would therefore be expected as a result”.

For the proposed changes to night-time operational hours, the rating level indicated potential for impact during the night, although “it is not anticipated to be adverse” and would be “unlikely to affect the sleep of nearby residents”.

Alton county councillor Andrew Joy said: “I have discussed the issue of potential night-time and weekend sound impact over several residential areas of Alton with Hampshire County Council’s planning department and notices of this application will now be posted over a significantly wider area. This is vitally important if Alton’s residents are to have sufficient opportunity to express their views. Public consultation and engagement is essential to enable the county council’s regulatory (planning) committee to understand and assess the environmental and highway issues objectively and fully when determining the application.”

The application is at planning.hants.gov.uk/ApplicationDetails.aspx?RecNo=18917 and people have up until February 9 to respond online.