Planning Inspectorate backs national park authority and rejects appeal to allow shepherds’ huts on land at Woodlands

A landowner must remove shepherds’ huts and shipping containers from their land after a planning appeal was dismissed.

The owner of Scatterbrook Stables in Ringwood Road, Woodlands, sought retrospective permission from the national park authority to introduce seven shepherds’ huts and two shipping containers.

The applicant also wanted retrospective permission to keep a cesspit installed on the land, plus a recycling and waste storage area and a parking and turning area.

These proposals were thrown out, and at a subsequent appeal the Planning Inspectorate, which sent an official to visit the site on 7th May who found no huts there, dismissed the application, too.

They wrote: “The introduction of built development and changes of land use within the fringe of the national park has the potential to erode the distinctive local character of the national park both individually and cumulatively, undermining the protected landscape.”

The inspector wrote the additions would “harm the character and appearance” of the area, adding: “Even though the proposal would be in an accessible location, it would not be in an appropriate location in terms of the development plan.

“The proposal would also harm the character and appearance of the area, and the protected landscape of the national park.

“It is clear that the limited benefits of the proposal would not outweigh the totality of the harm that I have identified.”