A MAJOR housebuilder has been given the green light to build 50 homes on a former fire station site.

A Durham County Council county planning committee granted outline planning permission for the former Durham fire station plot, on Finchale Road, Framwellgate Moor to be used for housing back in January 2014.

The County Durham and Darlington Fire and Rescue Service vacated the site, moving its headquarters to Belmont Business Park, its training to a new facility at Bowburn South Industrial Estate and building a new city fire station off the A691 at Sniperley, which cost £5m and was officially opened by the Bishop of Durham, the Right Reverend Paul Butler, in March.

Now Bett Homes has been granted full planning permission to build 50 homes on the two-hectare Finchale Road site.

The detailed application was granted by council planning officers acting under delegated powers.

There will be seven homes with three bedrooms, 19 with four and 17 with five, plus two four-bedroom bungalows and five two-bedroom affordable homes.

In a report on the application, council planners say: “The acceptability of the principle of residential development on the application site has been previously established, and the vehicular access point approved.

“The submitted details offer a welcome range of house types of attractive layout and appearance, and whilst the scheme takes a formulaic approach that might benefit from more imagination, as highlighted by the council’s design officer, it is nevertheless judged to be acceptable and not without merit.

“Overall this is a development that would enhance a deteriorating site, and offer housing to a range of customers in an accessible and convenient location, with the ability to merge with and complement the surrounding residential area.”

In its planning statement, Bett Homes says: “We consider that the proposed scheme represents a high quality scheme, both in design and planning terms, and will integrate seamlessly into the surrounding area.

“It has been designed in accordance with national and local planning policies and design best practice guidance.

“Overall a high quality environment is proposed which provides flexible and sustainable accommodation for future occupiers. The proposal will complement the character of the area by improving the appearance of what is at the moment a bland site that detracts from the character and appearance of the area by adding a development which has been designed having regard to the context and character of the surrounding.”

At the planning committee in 2014, councillors raised concerns that the normal requirement for 20 per cent of such a housing development to be affordable homes was being reduced to ten per cent.