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Distribution Centre on Local Wildlife Site refused

Distribution Centre on Local Wildlife Site refused

Furtho Pitts, Old Cosgrove Road

01 July 2026

We were instructed by the Furtho Development Opposition Group in August 2024 to write to the Council raising concerns about the proposal for a very large commercial distribution centre close the historic village of Cosgrove and the Union Canal Conservation Area. The development comprised nine units on the former Furtho Pit gravel works site for employment use as per the West Northamptonshire Local Plan allocation (Policy AL5).

In the intervening period, following work from the expert Dominic Woodfield at Bioscan, part of the site was designated as a Local Wildlife Site.

On publication of the Officer’s Report (OR) last week in advance of the committee meeting on 30 June, which recommended approval subject to conditions, we wrote again to the Council to highlight deficiencies in the officer’s presentation of the issues and legal errors in advice to members. Our objection focused on four areas: ecological harm, heritage harm, transport impacts and flood risk. At the meeting, members rejected the officer’s recommendation to approve and voted to refuse giving the following reasons in relation to ecology harm and harm to adjoining residential occupiers:

Loss of open mosaic habitat and the Furtho Pit Local Wildlife Site, with mitigation measures found not to outweigh the harm caused;
Unacceptable, significant adverse impacts on the visual amenity of occupiers of properties to the north of the site, arising from the size and scale of a number of the units; and
The absence of a section 106 planning obligation, resulting in a failure to secure sufficient mitigation for the impacts of the development and to deliver the commitments made in the proposal.

This matter highlights how a community’s proactive approach to identifying ecological assets and securing the Local Wildlife Site designation after the site was allocated in the local plan can result in a refusal. Under planning law (known as the Section 38(6) duty) members can refuse to approve an application in accordance with the development plan where material circumstances dictate otherwise – here the obvious reasons being the change in position in ecology and amenity harm caused by the scheme drawings.