PLANNING chairman Sue Halstead was forced to use her casting vote on Tuesday night, to give the green light to a controversial proposal for emergency homes for the homeless in Petersfield.

Members of the south planning committee heard that the Drum Housing Association had ripped up its original plan for flats and bed-sits in Woolner Avenue after neighbours mounted a fierce campaign against it.

South planners backed the residents in March and deferred a decision on the original plan, asking Drum to go back to the drawing board.

But the housing association architects withdrew the scheme and came up with a brand new one, hoping to address all the concerns of neighbours.

Before presenting it to EHDC planners this week, Drum Housing unveiled it to residents at a special consultation meeting.

But the new plan had done little to allay the fears of protesters and East Hampshire District Council received 31 letters of objection, just eight fewer than objections to the first plan.

This week planning councillors met to discuss the new plans for homes intended as emergency or urgent accommodation for homeless people in the town.

Several councillors were still worried about the size of the proposed development. They backed a proposal from Brian Dutton to refuse the plans. But there was deadlock when seven councillors voted against Mr Dutton's proposal.

Chairman Mrs Halstead was

forced to use her casting vote to

support the officers' recommendation to grant permission to the plan.

Planning officer Jeremy Heppell told councillors that there were many changes to the new plan. Originally, it had been housed in two blocks consisting of five flats and six bed-sits and now it consisted of three buildings – three flats and eight bedsits – with one courtyard which ran through the whole site.

Mr Heppell said the new plan had around 50 per cent less two-storey accommodation and the car parking had been reduced from 13 to nine spaces. One of the blocks had been rotated 90 degrees so that it no longer overlooked windows in North Road and a new refuse bins store had been included, moving them away from the boundary of the development.

"It is still a tight site and a tight development," Mr Heppell told the meeting "but I believe the concerns of councillors have been overcome and the matter is satisfactorily resolved."

But speaking for 17 residents, Peter Lyons said they still objected to the plan because it was over-development of a small site and they were concerned about the physical impact on neighbouring

properties.

"The repositioning of the buildings within the site does not solve the over-bearing issue," he said and added: "The communal area adjacent to the properties of North Road will encourage tenants to congregate leading to a concentration of noise in one area of the site."

He told councillors there was no sign of a natural buffer to maintain privacy along the boundaries of 7 and 9 Woolner Avenue.

Mr Lyons said residents were also concerned about increased traffic and lack of parking space.

And for Petersfield Town Council, George Watkinson said although the new plan was a great improvement, members still felt unable to support it.

"This site does need to be developed," he said, "but not as in this application."

But for Drum Housing Danny Mwasandube told the meeting: "Members of your committee put forward constructive criticism and suggestions to the previous plan and Drum Housing, taking on board these comments, has revised the scheme which is presently before you today. I trust you will appreciate the efforts of the association."

Petersfield councillor Andrew Pattie told fellow members: "What we are talking about is a pack of cards which has been reshuffled very imaginatively with skill and precision, but the fact of the matter is that the pack is still the same size – we are still in the region of a density of 90 to the hectare – and I cannot support the application while it stands at that level."

Fellow councillor Brian Dutton added: "The dice have been thrown again but the score is still the same."

And Bob Ayer told the meeting: "I share the view that this is overdevelopment on a pretty massive scale." He said he had re-read government guidelines on density and was satisfied: "It does not intend overdevelopment to this extent."

But Teresa Jamieson said the new plan had considerably reduced the impact on neighbours. "There are a lot of small sites which have been developed in a similar way, or will be in the future and so they should be. This is about the development of a brownfield site, close to the centre of the town and it fits in with our local plan

objectives."