A grey belt appeal has cleared the way for up to 280 homes at Little Bushey Lane in Hertfordshire after an Inspector allowed Redrow Homes’ outline scheme on 3 November 2026. The decision overturns Hertsmere Borough Council’s refusal for land on the eastern edge of Bushey and follows a public inquiry held in October.
Inspector Zoe Raygen found that the site qualified as grey belt and the proposal met the relevant national policy tests, including the requirements for affordable housing and infrastructure. Half of the proposed homes are secured as affordable housing. A separate costs decision also orders the council to pay part of Redrow’s appeal costs.
The grey belt appeal is particularly important because councillors had refused the application against an officer recommendation, then withdrew their opposition before the inquiry. The Inspector distinguished legitimate differences of planning judgement from refusal reasons that lacked supporting evidence. That distinction explains why the planning appeal succeeded while only part of the costs claim was allowed.
Why the grey belt appeal succeeded
The application, reference 24/1522/OUT, sought outline planning permission for up to 280 dwellings on land east of Little Bushey Lane and north of The Squirrels. Access was the only matter submitted for approval at this stage. A mobility and community hub within Use Class E, open space, drainage, parking and supporting works formed part of the scheme. Appearance, layout, landscaping and scale remain matters for future approval.
Hertsmere’s planning committee refused the application on 19 March 2026, citing Green Belt, landscape, highway infrastructure, flood risk and location concerns. Officers had recommended approval, but councillors were entitled to reach another planning judgement. By 17 July the council had moved to a neutral stance following further evidence and legal advice, so the inquiry proceeded without the authority actively defending its refusal.
For the grey belt appeal, Inspector Raygen applied the August 2026 National Planning Policy Framework. She considered the statutory Green Belt purposes and Hertsmere’s updated Green Belt assessment. The site comprises horse-grazing paddocks enclosed by trees and hedgerows near existing housing and the M1. It was not previously developed land, but that was not necessary: the grey belt definition can encompass other land with a limited contribution to specified Green Belt purposes.
The Bushey Green Belt assessment made the difference
The Inspector concluded that the land did not make a strong contribution to checking the sprawl of large built-up areas, preventing neighbouring towns from merging or preserving the setting of historic towns. Even assuming Bushey counted as a large built-up area, its partial enclosure by housing and the motorway weakened the land’s contribution to the first purpose. She therefore accepted that the site was grey belt for the policy assessment.
Planning Geek’s guide to grey belt and Green Belt land explains why the grey belt test is not the same as deciding whether a site is a brownfield site. Green Belt policy still matters, but it is applied through the current definition and the other conditions for development.
The grey belt appeal also turned on housing land supply, location and the national Golden Rules. The parties agreed that Hertsmere had a substantial housing shortfall and that the site was sustainably located. A signed section 106 agreement secures 50% affordable homes, infrastructure contributions and green space. The Inspector found the relevant tests met, making the development not inappropriate in the Green Belt without needing a separate very special circumstances case.
Landscape, transport and flood risk examined
Inspector Raygen accepted that building 280 homes would have a major impact on what is now open land. However, the effects were largely local and could be moderated through existing hedgerows, retained field patterns, proposed planting and subsequent detailed design. The presence of development along Bushey’s edge was relevant to her assessment of the wider landscape character.
Residents had raised concern about traffic on Little Bushey Lane, including at school arrival and departure times. The Inspector made site visits during peak periods and considered the highway evidence. The agreement includes bus-stop provision and five years of funding for an additional bus service, offering alternatives to private-car travel. She found no unacceptable highway-safety effect from the proposal.
Flooding was another disputed issue. The later material included technical drainage evidence and consultation responses, and the Inspector was satisfied that the proposal could be made acceptable through conditions, including detailed surface-water drainage arrangements before occupation. This is not an unconditional endorsement of every future drainage design, which will still have to meet the approval requirements. Planning Geek’s flood risk assessment guide explains what an FRA should cover and when the Sequential Test applies.
The previous 310-home proposal on a larger site had been dismissed in 2023, followed by litigation about the flood-risk sequential test. The legal context is discussed in Planning Geek’s Mead and Redrow High Court judgment. The new 280-home application was a different scheme considered under later evidence and national policy, so the earlier dismissal did not dictate the outcome.
Partial costs awarded against Hertsmere
In a separate decision issued on 3 November, Redrow sought a full award of costs against Hertsmere. The Inspector did not accept that changing the council’s position, or initially disagreeing with its officers on grey belt or landscape issues, was automatically unreasonable. She recognised that the council had gained new Green Belt evidence and had promptly informed the parties after reviewing its stance.
The position was different for the highway-mitigation, flood-risk and locational-sustainability elements of the refusal. Inspector Raygen found those grounds were “not supported by evidence capable of demonstrating a reasonable basis”. This is an exact extract from paragraph 16 of the separate Planning Inspectorate costs decision, reproduced under the Open Government Licence v3.0.
The award covers only the reasonable costs Redrow incurred responding to those unsupported elements before the council changed its position. It is not a full reimbursement of all inquiry costs, and no monetary figure was fixed in the decision. Planning Geek’s appeal costs guidance explains the need for unreasonable behaviour and unnecessary expense; a successful appeal alone is insufficient.
What happens after the appeal decision
The grey belt appeal results in outline planning permission for up to 280 homes, rather than a final approval of the individual house designs. Reserved-matters submissions, the section 106 obligations and conditions on access, ecology, landscaping and drainage remain important before development proceeds. The scheme is identified for housing in the emerging Hertsmere Local Plan, but that plan had not been adopted at the date of the decision.
In July, before the inquiry, a local report quoted councillor Glenn Briski describing the appeal as “no longer winnable” after publication of the revised Green Belt evidence. That was a contemporary political assessment, not the Inspector’s finding, and the subsequent decisions still required an independent examination of the proposal and the costs application.
The grey belt appeal is a reminder to applicants and authorities that evidence should be revisited as policy and technical circumstances change. It also shows why costs arguments must distinguish legitimate planning judgements from separate refusal reasons without a proper evidential basis. For landowners considering similar sites, affordable housing requirements can be fundamental to a grey belt scheme’s policy compliance.
The decision was made by Inspector Zoe Raygen on 3 November 2026, appeal reference 6009089. Hertsmere’s inquiry page gives the council’s account of the proceedings and underlying planning reference. The appeal decision is also available on AppealBase.
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