RESIDENTS protesting about a new housing development in Harpenden have been supported in their campaign by the town council.

At a meeting of the council's planning committee last Tuesday (June 25) councillors recommended that an application by Marchfield Developments Ltd to demolish two houses in Roundwood Lane and build ten new homes should be refused.

The garden one of one the two houses includes a small bluebell wood.

Councillors strongly objected to the plan saying it would have an unacceptable detrimental impact on neighbouring homes and would be not in keeping with the character of the area.

Residents have branded the development insensitive and sent more than 25 protest letters to the town council.

Mr Jim Hobley of Ridgewood Drive told the meeting that because the site slopes down from Roundwood Lane the proposed three-storey homes will dominate surrounding ones.

And in a letter to St Albans District Council, Mr Derek French of Roundwood Park complained that the plan would over develop the site.

He said he was also concerned about the loss of the small bluebell wood. He said: "It is the last in the Roundwood area. It greatly enhances the landscape."

The Harpenden Society has sent a letter to both district and town councils saying it is unhappy that protected trees in the wood would have to be felled.

Town councillors were also concerned about the extra traffic the development would cause to the already busy highway and the loss of protected trees in the woodland.

Councillor Bernard Lloyd said: "Ten homes is an unacceptable impact on this site.

"So we had to support the residents' view that it is an unsuitable overdevelopment of the area."

July 4, 2002 14:00