Plans for a 92,000 square meter glasshouse in the Lee Valley on greenbelt land at Nazeing near Harlow have been backed by the Court of Appeal.

Valley Grown Salads was granted permission for the expansion at its Paynes Lane site by the local authority in August 2014, but the decision was fought by the Lee Valley Regional Park Authority as, as well as being a green belt site, it said the site was within the Lee Valley Park and less than a mile from the Lee Valley Special Protection Area.

The principal issue in the case concerned the consequences of a proposal being appropriate (or “not inappropriate”) development in the Green Belt. The glasshouse was appropriate, since it was a “building for agriculture” under the first bullet of paragraph 89 of the NPPF. In his decision, Lord Justice Lindblom stressed that new buildings for agriculture and forestry are not viewed as “inappropriate” in the Green Belt.

Photo Credit: Volvo trucks

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