Barnet residents alarmed at prospect of a second site for travellers’ caravans in Arkley’s Green Belt

An application to Barnet Council for planning approval for a site for 12 travellers’ caravans in former woodland off Rowley Lane, Arkley, is meeting stiff objections on the grounds it would be a significant breach of the Green Belt.

Nearby residents say the caravans would overlook their homes and would result in further damage to a designated site of importance for nature conservation.

Woodland has already been cleared to create an entrance from Rowley Lane. On the plot itself, mature oak trees have been felled without permission.

A For Sale sign has been erected by a gate at the entrance to the site, which is bounded by Rowley Lane and Windmill Lane, and which extends to around an acre and a quarter.

Barnet Council failed in April to halt the go ahead for another travellers’ caravan site on a field in Green Belt land off Mays Lane, Arkley.

An attempt to secure a full judicial review of a planning inspector’s decision in favour of the travellers was rejected in the High Court allowing work to go ahead on preparing the site for two static caravans, two mobile homes and two day rooms.

The Rowley Lane application, which is for six pitches, each with a static and a touring caravan, has been made in the name of an agent, Philip Brown Associates of Rugby.

Objections include comments from residents of Windmill Lane who say approval would breach Green Belt policy and set a precedent for further development in woodland which the applicant claims should now be designated as “grey belt”.

Robin Bishop (above right), who leads on planning and the environment, said the Barnet Society was “strongly minded” to object to the application.

“Not only would it contravene Green Belt and Travellers policies in Barnet’s Local Plan, but it is also outrageous that protected trees have been illegally felled to clear the site.

“If approved, it would set a deeply worrying precedent for the remaining greenery between Akley and Borehamwood.”

Earlier this year Arkley residents protested to Barnet Council about the unauthorised felling of trees in the Rowley Lane protected woodland.

Trees were cut down across the plot which is one of ten in a ten-acre woodland which is at the rear of Rowley Lodge, and which were sold off for a combined total of £1.3 million.

So far, no work seems to have started preparing the site for travellers’ caravans in Mays Lane. The two-acre paddock was previously used for grazing horses.

Quinta Village Green Residents’ Association, which opposed the Mays Lane site and which was disappointed by the High Court setback, expressed its determination to continue doing all it could to protect the Green Belt along Mays Lane.

Gina Theodorou, chair of the association, said at the time that she feared the council’s failure to halt the scheme would result in further applications for travellers’ sites in Arkley’s Green Belt land.