The proposals, which were submitted to North Hertfordshire District Council and Stevenage Borough Council in 2001, had been opposed by North Hertfordshire, which successfully challenged a Secretary of State (SoS) decision to grant permission to the plans in 2009. In June this year, the SoS announced there would be a new public inquiry. The District Council said in a statement it was "delighted" that the plans had been withdrawn.
"Hertfordshire County Council is not against development, but it must be the right kind of development with the right infrastructure underpinning it," said Hertfordshire County Council's cabinet member for planning Richard Thake. "We did not feel that the west of Stevenage development proposals met those requirements."
Stevenage had supported the plans for the development and said it was disappointed that they had been withdrawn, but that it understood the decision by Taylor Wimpey. “Withdrawing the applications is a pragmatic response to the difficulties that the landowners and developers have faced over the last 12 years," a spokesperson for the Council said in a statement.
"Circumstances have changed markedly over that time and it has become impossible - for a variety of reasons - to bring forward the original scheme. We therefore acknowledge that pulling out of the scheme for 3,600 new homes was the only possible way forward for Taylor Wimpey."
“At a time when the country - and Stevenage - desperately needs more homes, the withdrawal of the applications for 3,600 homes and associated development to the west of Stevenage is a serious disappointment," the Council's executive member for planning and regeneration John Gardner added. "We had hoped that this development might have received more support from both central government and some fellow local authorities in order to deliver this important scheme."
