Residents in Penryn are incensed to have learned that an application to build up to 150 new homes on green field land is likely to be decided by planning officers without discussion by Cornwall Councillors.

Members of the Save College Valley campaign group discovered last week that the proposal by Walker Developments to build a new estate on land at College Valley in Penryn will probably be considered by council planning officer Peter Bainbridge as soon as the end of July, and not by a planning committee.

The group formed in 2015 in response to the first announcements of the plans, which members saw as taking away a treasured local green area, organising a mass protest in the town centre and writing a petition which gained over 2,000 signatures.

Now the outline application, which has received 48 public objections and no support on the council planning portal, is due for a decision. It had originally been scheduled for determination in October last year, but overran due to a second highways consultation after concerns were raised over the only access point being at Hill Head.

Save College Valley member Duncan said: “To suggest that a scheme that will utterly transform the setting of our town, destroy treasured countryside and the link with its and Cornwall’s vital history does not warrant the fullest consideration is nonsensical and a mighty kick in the teeth to the community.”

Another, Jane, added: “There is so much wrong with the application – it's slapdash, would result in a deadly pedestrian route on Hillhead and so much of the crucial detail would only be dealt with after the developers have the green light; that’s utterly scandalous.”

Peter Bainbridge told the Packet that planning rules brought in by the Conservatives in government had relaxed the requirements for large developments to go before committee, in addition to which there was no reason for the application to be taken before committee as it had not received much public opposition, and no local Cornwall Councillors - the site technically lies in Budock rather than Penryn - had called it in for debate.

He said: "At the moment we're looking to deal with it under delegated powers so it wouldn't be going to committee."

He added: "Discussions I've had with [local representatives], they're happy that it be dealt with under delegated powers, and there's no other reason why it would be called in.

"The number of objections isn't at the level where it would need a meeting."

Mary May, Cornwall Councillor for Penryn West, which includes a tiny part of the site, said she was having a meeting with highways officers about the site next week, and added that the latest application had not raised objections from Penryn Town Council.

She said: "I myself haven't got any problems, but you have to realise that not much of it sits within my division.

"But it would make sense, if there's no objections, if it didn't go to committee."

Representatives of the Glasney Green Space Regeneration Project, which has worked to restore the nearby Glasney Valley, said: "We really don't understand how this is meant to be of benefit to Penryn. The infrastructure concerns have never been properly addressed and we're flabbergasted that council officers deem the Hill Head Road access to be acceptable.

"The proposal as it stands was a compromise with the town council, agreed to due to the juicy carrot of acres of land gifted to the town with dowries of cash to protect it for all perpetuity. What we are left with is a potential development high up on the hillside - which the Cornwall Council officers were opposed to originally, as it was too prominent.

"This leaves the door open for all the fields, once on offer to the town, still at huge risk of development.

"We at the GGSRP have little faith left in the democratic process when it comes to planning matters, though we will still continue

to... resist the constant erosion through development that we have seen piecemeal over recent years."

The Packet has approached Budock's Cornwall Councillor, John Bastin, for comment.