A REJECTED plan to turn former railway sidings into storage yards has gone to appeal.

The scheme to convert old railway sidings in Howsell Road into a storage facility was turned down by Malvern Hills District Council’s planning committee in July.

Councillors felt the plan was “inappropriate” for the area and said the land had been earmarked for car parking in the Malvern Town neighbourhood plan.

There are already a handful of storage containers on the site but developers want to create a more intensive series of storage yards filled with containers.

An appeal has now been made, meaning a decision is now in the hands of a planning inspector, who has the power to overrule the council.

Setting out its case, developer Primary Industrial Properties said: “At the time of purchase the site was in a derelict state with excessive self-seeded foliage and vulnerability to antisocial behaviour and vandalism, particularly in and around the existing building on site.

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“The new owner has tidied up the site and removed around 1,000 old tyres and several hundred hypodermic needles, improved site security with new fencing, gates and CCTV, refurbished the existing on-site building and undertaken landscape and tree management works.”

In the planning meeting in July, committee members said the site would be better used as a car park - and that this formed part of a long-term transport strategy for Malvern.

But the developer argues: “Officers in their report to the planning committee reported that the highways authority stated that the car park is not viable and too difficult to achieve.

“As such the site is highly unlikely to come forward in the future as an infrastructure project as previously anticipated.”

The developer has also applied for the cost of the appeal to be covered by Malvern Hills on the grounds that the council “behaved unreasonably” in rejecting the scheme.

The council says its decision was well-reasoned and justifiable and strongly contests the claim of unreasonable behaviour.