PLANS for a further 164 homes and a ‘wildlife corridor’ at Winnington Village have been given the green light.

A mix of flats, semi-detached, detached and terraced houses will be built on the development, which is sandwiched between the sports complex, former Winnington Business Park and old Weir Engineering site off Winnington Avenue.

The proposal for the 9.2-acre site backing onto Moss Farm was approved by Cheshire West and Chester Council’s planning committee after recommendations from planning officers.

This is conditional to the developer contributing close to £950,000 in s106 money towards school places, GP facilities, open space provisions and highway improvements.

Planning documents for the application state: “The brownfield site has historically been occupied by industrial uses, but in recent years has been used intermittently for the open-air storage of containers and had little benefit for the wider area in terms of employment opportunities.”

“The 10-metre-wide strip of land which extends from Winnington Avenue through to the larger portion of the site has been proposed as a wildlife corridor.

“This could also be used as a pedestrian link between Winnington Avenue and the playing fields to the south of the site.

“The area would have a designated accessible walkway making it easy to navigate throughout the space, and surface changes could be explored to add interest, variation and texture to the area.

“Contemporary style seating will be placed along the corridor to improve usability and to encourage people to stop in the area for longer.”

The application was called before the planning committee by former councillor Susan Kaur on the grounds of the impact upon the highway network.

Northwich Town Council raised additional concerns over infrastructure impact and the lack of play space provision, while neighbours objected due to noise pollution and local schools not being able to accommodate more pupils.

Councillors Kate Cernik and Sam Naylor both spoke against the application, despite it being recommended for approval by the head of planning.

Members considered the already urgent need for major infrastructure improvements, including a second bridge at Winnington, to which planning officers responded that the Northwich Transport Strategy was ‘addressing’.

It was concluded that financial contributions from s106 money was expected to ‘commensurate’ the impact of the development and that traffic generated would be ‘modest’ but ‘not severe enough’ to breach National Planning Policy Framework.

On this basis, the planning application was approved by eight votes to three and work must commence within three years.