Comer Homes has U-turned on its pledge to extend Trent Park as part of its plan to build thousands of homes at Vicarage Farm, reports James Cracknell

The chief developer behind plans to build thousands of new homes on a major Green Belt site in Enfield has backtracked on the idea of extending Trent Park – threatening the scheme’s future in the process.

Comer Homes, which owns Vicarage Farm, had previously boasted in a submission to Enfield Council’s 2021 consultation on its draft Local Plan that, alongside new homes, it was proposing to “extend Trent Country Park towards Enfield Town”.

This idea was also enthusiastically endorsed by the council, in part as a way to compensate for the loss of Green Belt land to the south where a total of 3,700 new homes are envisioned, but also to “enhance” the area as a whole.

The draft Enfield Local Plan submitted to the Planning Inspectorate for determination last year explicitly referred to the need for any development to “facilitate a natural extension of Trent Country Park into the northern part of the area, retaining a natural parkland character, incorporating woodland, trees and hedgerows, wetland and grassland habitat, amenity green spaces, play areas and drainage attenuation”.

But at a Local Plan public examination hearing last Thursday (24th), during an in-depth discussion around the proposals for ‘Chase Park’ – which includes Vicarage Farm as well as other smaller, adjacent Green Belt sites also proposed for new housing – a representative for Comer Homes revealed that the developer now wants the farm to continue operating.

Catherine Mason from Savills, speaking on behalf of Comer, said: “The reason we’d like to keep it as a working farm is that it is a viable farm and there are tenants in there at the moment.”

She suggested the country park could still be created, as there were other examples of parks which included farmland. This point was also made by the council’s barrister Matthew Reed KC, who said: “There are different forms of country park, some are much more naturalistic than others.

“Trent Park is obviously a much more formal country park, [but] in others there is a free-roaming and naturalised approach which allows for livestock to be grazed, for example.

“It is that awareness that has led the council to conclude that you could combine the two.”

Mason later admitted that Comer’s preference now was for there to be no extension of Trent Park whatsoever but, if it was to be included in the Local Plan, to remove the words “natural parkland”. “That is the real sticking point,” she said. “That is something that would be difficult to achieve with the working farm.”

Listening to Mason explain the change in approach to what had been suggested previously, independent planning inspector Steven Lee – who will ultimately decide if the Local Plan is adopted – became more and more frustrated.

Lee said: “It is the council’s position that the country park is not only about providing mitigation for the harm of losing Green Belt, it is also about providing enhancement.

“Why don’t Comer want to be part of that approach, having been part of this development for several years and having been all in favour of promoting it? What purpose is there in resisting that element?”

Mason responded: “There has been an awful lot of discussion around compensation and what is required and I guess we don’t see this is required to offset the release of the Green Belt.”

Lee, clearly irritated, then asked: “The council has decided that in order to help create an overall acceptable and sustainable form of development, they want to see something specific in the vision. And it goes beyond mitigating the harm, it is about adding value to the area, to the borough. Is it fair to say that your vision would not deliver the same degree of benefit?”

Mason admitted it would not be “exactly the same degree of benefit” because “it wouldn’t be entirely open”, after which Lee asked: “Does Comer accept that it would call into question the whole scheme getting planning permission?”

Mason said: “We understand we’d have to have discussions around the masterplan document and there could be conflicts if we came to the planning application stage, which is why we’d prefer to get it addressed now.”

However, Lee said it was “clear” what the council expected, and that the working farm was not compatible with it. He continued: “To me, it is quite fundamental. If you read the [Local Plan] policy as a whole, it keeps coming back to the country park. It is not just a tag on. It is a crucial part of the vision. If it can’t be delivered in the way the council envisage it, it will have an affect on the planning balance.”

A map of Chase Park taken from the Local Plan, with areas for housing marked in pink

As well as Vicarage Farm, Chase Park includes Trent Park Equestrian Centre near Oakwood, land to the south of Enfield Road known as Glebe Fields, the Royal Enfield Rifles site, and Arnold House in The Ridgeway, a vacant care home which has already won planning permission to be rebuilt and expanded.

The Arnold House site, in the far east of the Chase Park area, is also earmarked by the council as potentially providing new road access, although the Local Plan examination heard that to do so would involve cutting through a small area of woodland designated as a borough-grade site of importance for nature conservation, as well as having a tree preservation order.

However, Chris Cole, the council’s head of strategic transport policy, clarified the proposed new road alongside Arnold House was “not fundamental” to the allocation of new homes at Chase Park, and that the two main points of access would be via Enfield Road in the south and Hadley Road in the north.

It is hoped, but not confirmed, that a new bus route linking with Crews Hill could run through the site, while existing bus services could be diverted via a “bus loop” within Chase Park. However, most of the area is not within walking distance of either Oakwood or Enfield Chase stations, and Transport for London has previously objected to its allocation for housing on the basis it would “become car dependent”.

The debate on transport at the hearing centred largely around this point, with concerns also being raised over the council’s traffic modelling – at one point forcing Reed to admit that an error had been made and acknowledging that more work was needed. It was also heard that the level of car ownership at Chase Park would likely lead to around 4,000 new vehicles in total.

Earlier in the year, when the first stage of the Local Plan examination took place, it was heard that “high harm” would be caused to the Green Belt at Chase Park, in particular affecting views across Vicarage Farm.

On this point, Philip Russell-Vick, a chartered landscape architect commissioned by The Enfield Society to study the impact on these views, told the hearing on Tuesday, 22^nd July: “It’s not the foothills of the Lake District or the Yorkshire Dales, but in terms of a London context it is a recognisable and highly valuable piece of landscape, and it should be considered as such.”

The Enfield Local Plan public examination is continuing this week with discussions around brownfield housing areas such as Meridian Water, Angel Edmonton and New Southgate. All sessions can be watched live via the council’s YouTube channel:
Visit youtube.com/@EnfieldCouncil

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