Rumbling on

Yennadon Quarry from Yennadon Down

The longest running saga in Dartmoor planning rumbles on.  No - I'm not talking about the eviction battle at Steward Community Woodland.  I'm talking about Yennadon Quarry, on the outskirts of Dousland near Burrator, and their intentions to expand.

If you've seen this quarry in the past decade, you'll appreciate how the boundary pushes hard against the surrounding fence, providing livestock, dog-walkers and Letterboxers alike airy cliff-edge views deep into the workings from Yennadon Down.  As early as June 2008, the quarry operators have been investigating - through official channels - the potential for expansion.  Their intention is to expand North, increasing the size of the quarry by roughly a third.  Opposition to the plan cite concerns regarding, amongst other things, the increased noise levels, traffic, dust, plus the impacts on local ecology, common land, and water run off.   Up until now, committee rejections, conditions applied, repeated delays and red tape have have frustrated the quarry owner's efforts.  Local residents and Dartmoor organisations have been polarised on the issue.  The Dartmoor Preservation Association object to the plan, whilst the Dartmoor Society broadly support it.  Proponents point at increased local employment, and the sustainable extraction of a useful, desirable and ancient resource: Dartmoor granite.

Peek Hill from Yennadon Down

The expansion plan was initially refused by the National Park Authority in 2014.  Amended, with conditions applied, it was resubmitted in 2015.  Planning Officers recommended that it be refused again, due to the "unacceptable impacts on Dartmoor's special qualities" including landscape and tranquility.  However, the Authority never got to formally consider the new application since the late arrival of some documents delayed the decision in December 2015, then again in February 2016, and it then failed to reappear at May's meeting as all had hoped.

18 more months have come and gone.  So much time has now passed, local development criteria has changed, quarry precedents elsewhere have been set, and earlier conditions have been revisited by different planning staff.  So, the Planning Officer's recommendation has been changed from 'Reject' to 'Approve'.  The refreshed application finally made it back to the DNPA Development Committee's meeting in July this year, only for the complex legalities of the planning process to thwart progress yet again.  This time, written advice from a QC had been received late in the day before the meeting, and Planning Officers had not had time to reflect on this.  The earliest opportunity for the plans to be reconsidered is now October.  Frustration for the quarry operators and local residents.  More 'ball kicking' from the authorities and legal teams.  It rumbles on.