A MAJOR East Hampshire tourist attraction has taken the first step towards dreams of boosting and improving its facilities.

Staff and volunteers at Mid Hants Railway breathed a sigh of relief when district councillors turned one of their own planning policies on its head, to allow more than 100 protected trees to be bulldozed to make way for 12 two and three-bedroom homes. The development will fund a package of improvements for the Alresford-based attraction that could run into hundreds of thousands of pounds.

These could include a new steam locomotive, a museum-type shed at Ropley, developing a picnic area at Alresford and speeding up the repair of locomotives currently awaiting overhaul.

Councillors were given a stark choice: either see all the trees, which all have Tree Preservation Orders (TPOs), lost from the 0.41 hectare embankment in Chawton Park Road, Alton; or say goodbye to a substantial cash injection into the tourist attraction that would in turn boost the tourist industry in East Hampshire as a whole.

Under the plans, a new embankment would be formed to the railway line at Chawton Park Road with 157 young trees and 22 mature trees and an existing woodland area in Ropley would be extended, and opened up to the public.

After a lot of soul searching, East Hampshire District Council's north planning committee agreed to grant permission, by a majority of 12 to seven.

Case officer Keith Oliver advised that, on balance, the boost to the district's tourism outweighed the loss of the trees.

"Clearly like most volunteer tourist activities, they are strapped for cash but if they were able to sell the land they would develop their site at Ropley with new education facilities and improving the research workshops, thus improve the tourist facility in East Hampshire – one of the main tourist facilities in the district," he said.

In direct contrast, Stewart Garside, the council's arboricultural officer, advised members to reject the application.

He said it would not be possible to save any of the trees on the site, despite the plans showing that around 14 would not be demolished.

"As a result of the required level changes, all the trees on this section of the site would be lost," Mr Garside said.

"This would represent a substantial loss of amenity to the area. The importance of these trees within the local landscape was identified by the county council arboricultural officer when he first proposed that they be made the subject of a Tree Preservation Order (TPO) in 1973. The district council shared the view when it made the TPO in 1976 and, more recently, the principal landscape officer has identified the 'profound contribution' the trees make in the local landscape."

Allan Chick, who represents Alton Whitedown, said: "The trees are of concern but so is the economic situation. Without this development, the Watercress Line will not be able to proceed with its lottery application and if it misses out this time, it would be many years before it would be able to apply again because the money would be used elsewhere."

Geoffrey Whittle, ward member for Headley, said: "I am sorry to see these trees lost but it is not going to impact on the whole of East Hampshire. We will still be an area of outstanding beauty, we will lose some trees, some more will go up and people in a couple of years will see the development and have forgotten what has gone before.

"We need to balance this out. We will lose some trees now but in time, the whole situation will change and it won't even be noticed or do we want to lose the Watercress Line?"

But Helen Walters, who represents Whitehill Deadwater, was shocked at even the thought of demolishing the trees.

She said: "I'm very fearful because this is just so out of character for this committee, we debate about losing one or two trees and here we are saying 'let's just swipe down 100 because they are in the way'. This is not a decision between trees and the Watercress Line, this is one part of the Watercress Line. It is not a direct decision between the two."

Adam Carew, member for Whitehill Walldown, added: "I'm concerned about the sort of message we would be giving if we allow these trees to be felled. I think it could set a precedent."

Despite getting the backing of the majority of the committee, Mid Hants Railway now faces an anxious wait because the development could still be "called in" to be determined by a government inspector because it goes against the Local Plan – the development blueprint for the area.

The plan says that developments that would destroy or damage one or more trees with TPOs will be refused unless it is in the interests of arboricultural practice. Both the council's arboricultural officer and principal landscape officer argued that it was not.

The council now has to advertise the decision for 21 days as a departure from the Local Plan, during which time the Government Office for the South East (GOSE) could decide to call it in. Colin Chambers, managing director of Mid Hants Railway, said he was pleased with the decision, but he would not be preparing a bid for a Heritage Lottery Fund grant or drawing up plans for where the money would be spent until the deadline for the application to be called in had passed.

"We first started looking at this in 1999 and we have got some ideas for what we would like to do, but until we got planning permission we didn't want to spend too much time on developing the ideas," he said.

"I was a bit worried really about whether we were going to get planning permission or not because of the TPOs, but I am very pleased that we got it.

"It will be six to 12 months before we put any application into the lottery fund, but we will wait until the 21 days are up before doing anything more."