AN APPLICATION for the creation of a horticulture nursery at Kirkby-in-Furness has been recommended to the district council's planning committee for refusal.

The submission includes the erection of 'steel-framed portal buildings, glasshouses and poly tunnels' and a temporary residential dwelling, as well as landscaping works and the formation of a revised access to the site.

The horticulture nursery would be set up on land off School Road. 

In a report published ahead of the meeting of South Lakeland District Council's (SLDC's) planning committee on Thursday, case officer Charlotte Pinch says applicant Marc Charnley has provided 'insufficient evidence to demonstrate that there is an essential need for the development in this location'.

"Nor is it located within or adjacent to an existing farm or agricultural building complex. Moreover, by virtue of the development's scale and siting, the proposal does not seek to minimise the impact on the qualities of the open countryside," says Ms Pinch in the report.

"By virtue of its scale, industrial design and siting on open agricultural land, the proposed horticulture nursery development would result in a prominent, readily visible and unsympathetic addition to the open countryside, which would cause unacceptable harm to the landscape character from short- and long-ranging views, for which landscaping would not adequately mitigate."

She says: "The requirement for a 2.5m-high acoustic fence on the western boundary of the site within close proximity of existing residential dwellings, by virtue of the existing topographical land-level differences, would result in a severely overbearing boundary structure."

Ms Pinch says the fence would result in 'unacceptable harm to the residential amenity' to the occupiers of the property High Tor. 

The proposed application site is an undeveloped piece of land currently used for agricultural purposes.

Ms Pinch's report notes that the application is part-retrospective.

"An access track has been installed from the A595 to the site, in addition to the creation of two earth bunds on the eastern boundary of the site, without planning permission," she says.

The application is to be scrutinised by SLDC's planning committee this week.