LOCAL councillors are furious after a property developer will use a Dinas Powys road for construction vehicles to access a 215 home building site.

Despite councillors saying there has been months of negotiation, site meetings, proposals and counter-proposals, developers Barratt (BDH Homes) will now be using Murch Road for their vehicles to enter the building site at the former St Cyres Lower School area.

Cllr Andy Robertson said: “The Vale Planning Committee voted unanimously to refer the matter of the Construction Traffic Management Plan back to officers on the understanding that our four local councillors would have to affirm any solution. We really thought the village had been thrown a life-line.

“We worked around the clock to find an alternative access that would not have cost the developers a penny. But they seemed determined to use what most people consider not just a difficult but potentially dangerous route down Murch Crescent and over the railway bridge past the Infant School."

Cllr Robertson previously said he, fellow councillors and members of the public were not against the houses being built if they could have waited until a Dinas Powys by-pass was discussed further. The main concern the councillors had was public safety.

He said: “We had various meetings with land-owners only to discover they’d been told all sorts of things to put them off agreeing to a deal to cross their land. Health and safety was given as one reason when the developer has been using the same route with their St Joseph’s School housing project for months. In the end we’ve had to concede.”

Cllr Robertson said he was also aware that some people will attempt to put a political spin on the situation but that the original planning was granted by the previous administration with different local representation.

“If we’d refused to grant the final planning the developer would have been able to appeal to the Welsh Government Planning Inspectorate and almost certainly had it over-turned," he said.

"That could have cost council tax-payers over £100,000 in legal fees.”

Cllr Robertson said the whole incident had left a very bad taste with all his colleagues and they would scrutinise movement on the route at every move.

“The Traffic Plan makes clear no construction vehicle can use the route from 30 minutes before and after the two schools on the route start and finish daily", he said.

"We shall be watching to make sure this rule is adhered to the minute.”