Builders reveal plans for another large housing estate in the Dearne Valley

The land, at Thurnscoe Bridge Lane, near the dog-track, was earmarked for housing by Barnsley Council when it drew up a Local Plan, covering future housing and business developments, around five years ago.

That means housing of some kind is likely to be approved for the site, but builders’ proposals still need to go through the system for planning permission.

Avant Homes have contacted residents in the area to say they are in the process of drawing up a planning application which is expected to feature 290 houses, between one and four bedroomed in size.

They are now asking residents for their views on the scheme, before going ahead and finalising their plans, which will then be submitted to the council, which will decide whether they are appropriate.

The company has already held discussions with the council’s planning officers, which has helped guide the current proposal.

Under their current proposals, Avant Homes want to build a range of homes, including terraced houses, semi-detached and detached homes to cater for all market sectors in the area.

Twenty-nine would be given over to ‘affordable housing’, for rent or purchase. Large new developments are now required to include affordable homes, a move which aims to help alleviate the problem of people being unable to find homes to rent or get on the housing ladder.

The homes themselves would feature innovative energy saving measures, so in addition to solar panels to generate electricity, they will feature technology to suck heat back from waste water before it goes into the drains.

Charging points for electric vehicles will also be installed and the site will have an ‘attenuation area’, which will take run-off water from the development in periods of extreme weather.

Residents have until October 4 to contact Avant, but residents have already started to air concerns about a lack of infrastructure, including doctors’ surgeries, schools and shops to serve so many new residents.

Similar concerns have been raised at Darfield, where an application for almost 500 new homes has just been submitted.