SECRETARY of State for Communities and Local Government Eric Pickles has today (Tuesday, September 11) refused permission for a Bishop's Stortford super-school.
After a nail-biting wait for opponents of the Herts & Essex and Bishop’s Stortford high schools' expansion plans, the Tory heavyweight has backed the conclusions of inspector David Wildsmith – who heard the schools' appeal at a planning inquiry in the town last September – and rejected the bulk of their proposals.
He has agreed with the heads of Stortford’s other secondaries, the town's civic federation, the town council and planning authority East Herts District Council that the schools should not be allowed to use Green Belt land off Whittington Way at Thorley for a new joint campus and sell off their prime sites in London Road, Beldams Lane and Warwick Road for hundreds of new homes, proposed in five applications.
He has backed a single bid – appeal B – against the decision by EHDC to refuse planning permission for the change of use to school sports fields with changing facilities at Bishop's Stortford High School's Jobbers Wood ground, off Great Hadham Road.
