People living near stables on green belt land have vowed to fight a second application to build large family homes on the site.

Developer Elliot Pomerance has applied to Epping Forest District Council for planning permission to build six houses with four or more bedrooms and an additional 20 parking spaces in Grove Lane, Chigwell.

It comes six months after a simialr proposal for the site was rejected following a community campaign, which claimed the designs did not fit with surrounding cottages and sought to protect the green belt. 

A spokesman for the Grove Lane Residents' Group said: “What is astounding is that in February of this year Epping Council empathetically rejected their last application.

“It’s an issue about Green Belt and as far as I’m aware that hasn’t changed.”

The group is also concerned about increased levels of traffic.

A similar proposal was rejected on February 5 by the district council.

Minutes of a meeting of Area Planning Sub-Committee South in February said: “The proposed development is inappropriate in the Green Belt and, by definition, harmful.

“It fails to protect the openness of the Green Belt and encroaches into the countryside to a significantly greater degree than existing structures on site.

It continued: “The proposed sub-urban development proposed is at a scale at odds with the surrounding context and would harm the rural setting of Millers Farmhouse a Grade II Listed Building by diminishing its significance.”

Jack Baron of designer David Plant Architecture Ltd said every effort had been made to address concerns.

He added: “We have made some amendments to the previous application and the new proposals will look more like the surrounding properties.

“We have stepped back the properties from Grove Lane to reduce the visual impact and we have also increased the landscaping between Grove lane and the development.”

Grove Lane Resident’s Group is set to meet tomorrow to discuss the issue.