PEOPLE living on the border of Medstead and Four Marks are urging East Hampshire planners to give them a break as plans roll out for another 58-home development off Boyneswood Road.

Located outside the settlement policy boundary for South Medstead, the application by the William Lacey Group would form a continuation of the 80-home Bellway Homes development currently being built on the Boyneswood Lodge site, through which access would be gained to extend the estate behind the Friars Oak homes to abut Chawton Park Woods.

Already worn down by years of constant roadworks, heavy construction traffic, dust and noise, residents view this latest application as the final straw.

One anguished resident said: “I came to live in Medstead for its peaceful rural location, but that has long gone.”

With so much development going on at the same time on sites in the Boyneswood Road and Lymington Bottom Road triangle, residents have had their fill of traffic congestion, road and bridge closures and general disruption - but their despair is not being aimed just at the developers, or local councillors who, they say, have battled on their behalf to try to mitigate the impact and keep contractors in line, but on the local authorities who have allowed this level of development to happen without a thought, it seems, for the impact on the lives of people who have to live through it.

In a letter to the Alton Herald this week, David Curtis pointed out: “The crisis in housing isn’t just numbers, it’s the inherent lack of logic and commonsense in the planning system. For example, the planning applications are taken in isolation rather then viewed within the context of the hundreds of other houses already applied for or approved. How can the impact on infrastructure and utilities be properly mitigated?”

Even worse, in this latest application William Lacey argues against a pre-submission consultation on grounds that the proposed development would raise the same issues as those consulted upon with the local community and considered in detail by East Hampshire District Council (EHDC) when assessing the approved Bellway development - on land originally owned by William Lacey.

And that these issues, including increased traffic and the impact on the Boyneswood Road railway bridge, mains drainage, surface water and sewage disposal issues, loss of wildlife and natural habitat, preference for brownfield development and over-development of the area, had been addressed at that time.

Nonetheless, despite having only just been posted, its application for 35 open market and 23 social rented homes on this new six-acre site has already attracted strong objection to this argument, with one correspondent summing up: “The additional impact to the area of yet more houses will be significant and the public have an absolute right to challenge the developers rather than be subjected to their patronising assumptions that all has been considered and incorporated.”

Objectors also raise concern that what have started as small developments in the past have a habit of growing and that infrastructure within both Medstead and neighbouring Four Marks “is closely coming to breaking point”, putting strain on the schools, doctors’ surgeries, and the road network - in particular the junctions onto the A31 where, in peak rush hour, vehicles have to rely on the goodwill of other motorists to allow them out.

Furthermore, objectors stress that the site lies outside the settlement policy boundary (as agreed in the Medstead and Four Marks Neighbourhood Plan), changes the character of the area “from rural to urban”, and the 175 housing requirement for Four Marks and South Medstead by 2028 has already been far exceeded.

While William Lacey agrees that the principle of development on the greenfield backland site does give rise to a degree of conflict with planning policies (both adopted and emerging), it is seen to represent a “remnant of leftover land from previous permissions” which, while outside the settlement policy boundary, is essentially landlocked and therefore ripe for development “as it serves no useful planning purpose”.

The applicant also argues that, in its opinion, the site would meet the requirements of the Government’s National Planning Policy Framework with its presumption in favour of sustainable development.

And it challenges EHDC’s five-year housing land supply, having identified a shortfall in delivery of 771 housing units against its target from 2011 to 2017.

Convinced that there is no justification for the additional housing and that the requirement has been met, residents are calling on East Hampshire planners to back them by refusing the application.

Mr Curtis is firm in his criticism: “You’re on watch while Alton and its surrounding areas are dug up, concreted over and the developers pocket the cash while locals suffer the effects.

“This isn’t planning or development, it’s crisis management.”

Find out about planning applications that affect you by visiting the Public Notice Portal.

Commenting on the new application, district councillor Ingrid Thomas expressed concern over the problems that already exist due to development in the Boyneswood Road area, adding: “Four Marks and Medstead have had more than their share of development and now our community needs time to take a breath and try to get the infrastructure built that we need so badly.”