Too many planning applications follow the same frustrating path of being recommended for approval, but when considered by a planning committee, it is knocked off-course by a local ward councillor eager to please local residents and subsequently is voted down. A classic case of a policy-compliant proposal being defeated by NIMBYism.

And so, it’s a cause for celebration when the reverse occurs: when local residents together with the ward councillor, go out of their way to express enthusiasm for a scheme and in doing so gain unanimous support from a planning committee.

Emily Grapes, Planner in Carter Jonas’ Cambridge office achieved exactly this when submitting a planning application on behalf of a local farmer and landowner for the conversion of vacant agricultural barns into seven new homes in the Cambridgeshire village of Horningsea.

Adding to her success was the fact that the site lies within the Horningsea Conservation Area and is adjacent to the Green Belt and open countryside. The manor house, gardens of which adjoin the site, is Grade II listed, deeming the site ‘curtilage listed’. Furthermore, under Policy S/11 of the South Cambridgeshire Local Plan, residential development in Horningsea is restricted to just two units.