Hemsworth: New homes on stadium site set for green light after 14 years

Plans to build 128 homes on a former athletics stadium site are set to be approved by councillors nearly 15 years after the application was submitted.

Saul Homes plans to build properties on the former Hemsworth Athletics Stadium site, off Kirkby Road.

The application was delayed by a series of legal challenges, which led to a Supreme Court ruling that a further challenge could not be made.

The plans will be discussed by Wakefield Council on Thursday.

The original planning application was submitted in January 2008 and approved in principle 2010.

But the decision was quashed by the High Court because the council did not carry out a report into whether an environmental impact assessment would be needed, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service.

The plans were approved again in 2016 after the report was carried out.

Once again the decision was quashed by the High Court after a legal challenge.

The Secretary of State stepped in to rule that the development did not need the environmental impact assessment and another legal challenge was refused by the Supreme Court in May 2021, according to a planning report by Wakefield Council.

A replacement sports facility was built at Sandygate Lane and the former stadium site has not been used for five years.

Planning officers at the council recommend the application be approved at the meeting on 13 October.

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