Brighouse quarry review leads to more than 100 objections

Calderdale Council’s Planning Committee are being asked to determine the conditions for Marshalls Mono Limited’s continuing or extending to quarry stone and deposit mineral waste at Crows Nest Quarries, St Giles Road, Lightcliffe.

The issue will be considered when the committee meets at Halifax Town Hall next Tuesday (May 8, 2pm onwards).

Officers recommend they approve conditions for operations at the quarry, which has been active since the early 1900s and at which all extraction is required to stop by February 21, 2042.

They explain it is not an application for new quarrying activities and as such an assessment of the principle of development itself cannot take place.

But the application for review of the conditions has been submitted at the request of the council, acting as Mineral Planning Authority, as part of a requirement laid down in the 1995

Environment Act which stipulates all mineral permissions must be reviewed every 15 years unless an application for postponement has been granted.

Residents’ main concern is the suitability of St Giles Road and Spout House Lane for any increase in heavy goods vehicles (HGVs).

Other concerns include safety – as an access point is via Grassy Lane, a bridleway used by schoolchildren and dog walkers and is an access to Brighouse Town football ground – and ecological concerns over loss of trees, wildlife and habitat as quarrying is extended.

Ward councillor George Robinson (Conservative, Hipperholme and Lightcliffe) asked for the application to be considered by councillors due to concerns.

“St Giles Road and Spout House Lane are unsuitable for 60 lorry movements a day, given the narrow and congested nature of the road,” he said.

“The application will remove a vast amount of trees…and the site is a location of protected rare orchids.”

Officers recommend the extension should be allowed after applying the council’s planning rules, subject to 43 detailed conditions, because “the proposal is in accordance with the policies and proposals in the Replacement Calderdale Unitary Development Plan…and there are no material considerations to outweigh the presumption in favour of this review of an old mineral permission.”