PLANS for another housing development in Hopwood have been met with anger by residents, which has left them feeling that 'Hopwood is being dumped on.'

A planning application for 15 affordable homes including three retirement bungalows on Ash Lane has been put to Bromsgrove District Council, a street away from another proposal for 22 homes.

Residents of Ash Lane have expressed their grave concerns about the possibility of adding another potential 30 cars to an already busy and tight lane.

Ash Lane is the main access point for Hopwood Garden Centre, and two rugby clubs; Five Ways Old Edwardians RFC and Kings Norton RFC, so there is a constant stream of traffic on a lane that already has issues with space for two cars.

Bromsgrove Advertiser: Proposed site for redevelopment of 15 homes. Proposed site for redevelopment of 15 homes.

Judith Rees who lives opposite the potential development site says the possible point of access to the site is situated on the narrowest part of the road and on a bend restricting visibility.

Judith added: "I built a bungalow on my driveway which took me four years to get passed. I could not have a separate driveway from my existing house due to the lack of visibility, but now this site will potentially be built with even poorer visibility."

Currently the lane floods due to heavy rain and excess water from the Worcester and Birmingham canal, which would be at the rear of the proposed site.

Bromsgrove Advertiser: Flooding outside Ms Dockerty's house.Flooding outside Ms Dockerty's house.

Ash Lane resident, Sharryn Dockerty says her drive floods frequently so concreting over land where water runs down will make the issue worse than it already is.

The majority of residents on Ash Lane are long standing and say the amount of houses in the village has doubled in the last ten years and there are no amenities to support the growth.

Another resident, Dawn Buchanan said: "Ash Lane has already played its part for social housing in the form of Woodpecker Close and also the neighbouring Smedley Crook.

"In Woodpecker Close alone there are 20 affordable houses not far off equalling the total other houses on the whole of the lane, this is far higher than the expected 80/20 split the government require and this new development would be a completely different site too so not even expanding the existing housing estate, actually encouraging additional urban sprawl rather than preventing it!

"At present there is already a lot of anti-social behaviour from certain residents of Woodpecker close, these families are actually from out of the parish area, so it shows that the affordable homes are not actually allocated within the parish, people from all over are being housed in them."

Bromsgrove Advertiser: Ash Lane foods frequently. Ash Lane foods frequently.

The Advertiser reported last week that a planning application has been put forward for 22 dwellings on land next to Redditch Road and to the rear of Smedley Crooke Place - which along with the proposal for Ash Lane are greenbelt sites.

Ms Buchanan added: "This proposed development shows no regard to the Neighbourhood Plan or displays any special circumstances or acceptable reasons as to why it should be allowed to contravene existing Local or National Green Belt policies. The proposed development would therefore be in conflict with the BDC [Bromsgrove District Council] plan."

The applicant, Mrs Robinson, has proposed five, two bedroom bungalows, of which three will be retirement bungalows for the over 55's, six two bedroom homes and four three bedrooms family homes.

The site has already been the subject of potential redevelopment, with a planning application put forward to the council in 2017 for three homes but was refused due to not 'respecting the design and character of the existing street scene.'