Obsidian Strategic wants up to 80 homes at Marsh Lane, Eversley, where Bovis was refused 121 in 2015. Hart's pre-application advice is due on 22 September.

A London land promoter has asked Hart District Council what it thinks of up to 80 homes on farmland at Marsh Lane, Eversley Cross. The council refused 121 houses on the same field in 2015, and won costs against the developer who appealed.

The request was lodged by Obsidian Strategic on 21 August and validated by Hart on 1 September. It is reference 26/01435/PREAPP, and the council’s determination deadline is Tuesday 22 September. (Hart District Council planning register)

Eversley Cross is about four and a half miles north of Fleet, on the Hampshire side of the Berkshire border, and roughly a mile west of Yateley.

This is not a planning application. It is a request for pre-application advice, and there is no public consultation on it. Hart’s own guidance is blunt about what the answer is worth. Officers’ pre-application advice “does not constitute a formal response or decision by the Council”. It is a material consideration, but it “cannot be held to bind the Council in its validation or formal determination of a subsequent application”. (Hart District Council, pre-application planning advice)

Timeline of planning activity on land adjacent to Marsh Lane, Eversley, from the 2015 refusal of 121 homes through the withdrawn appeal and costs award to the 2026 pre-application for up to 80 homes

What is being proposed

The single document on the file is a vision document dated January 2026. Its schedule of accommodation sets out 79 homes, described throughout as “up to 80”. (Vision document, 26/01435/PREAPP)

Tenure Homes Share
Affordable 32 40%
Private 47 60%
Total 79 100%

The affordable half is weighted to small homes: 13 one-bedroom flats, eight two-bedroom flats, three two-bedroom houses, seven three-bedroom houses and one four-bedroom house. Of the affordable total, 65% would be for rent and 35% for affordable home ownership. The private homes run the other way, with 21 three-bedroom and 10 four-bedroom houses.

Other commitments in the document:

  • buildings of two to two-and-a-half storeys
  • 15% of market homes built to the accessible and adaptable standard, Building Regulations part M4(2)
  • 5% of plots to be considered for self and custom build, subject to site suitability and demand on the register
  • a linear wetland drainage feature along the eastern boundary
  • a landscape buffer along the western boundary, where four or five existing properties sit close to the edge
  • a footpath, either through the site or along Marsh Lane, to connect to Reading Road

The promoter also says it will investigate cutting the speed limit on Marsh Lane to 30mph, which it argues would remove the need for a right-turn lane into the site.

The 2015 refusal, and what happened next

The field already has a long planning history. Bovis Homes applied in May 2015 to build 121 houses there, with a Suitable Alternative Natural Greenspace attached. Hart refused it on 15 October 2015 on twelve separate grounds. (Notice of decision, 15/01295/FUL)

The first reason is the one that shapes the current proposal. The council said the scheme’s scale, density and suburban design would harm the rural character of the area. It would also fail to preserve the Up Green and Eversley Cross Conservation Areas. And it would “physically and visually merge the two small rural and historic settlements of Eversley Cross and Up Green”.

The other eleven reasons covered:

  • affordable housing provision, and the market housing mix
  • the road network, sustainable transport, parking and access
  • the flood risk sequential test, and the design of a realigned Marsh Lane
  • a significant adverse effect on bats
  • tree and hedge protection, and pressure to fell protected trees next to housing plots
  • whether the greenspace would actually draw people away from the Thames Basin Heaths
  • an existing shortage of leisure provision near the site

Bovis appealed in December 2015. An inquiry was fixed for 1 November 2016. The company withdrew on 6 September 2016, without warning or explanation, and Hart applied for its costs.

The Secretary of State agreed with the council. A decision dated 22 December 2016 found that the appeal had been withdrawn without good reason, and that Bovis had therefore acted unreasonably. It ordered the company to pay Hart’s costs of the appeal from 11 January 2016 onwards. The amount was left to the parties to agree. (Costs decision, APP/N1730/W/15/3140372)

Obsidian’s document devotes a page to those refusal reasons under the heading “Analysis of Previous Masterplan & Lessons Learnt”. It does not mention the appeal or the costs award.

What has changed

The headline change is size: 80 homes rather than 121, on the northern half of the site rather than all of it. The document says that reduction “will help reduce any impact on the local highway network”.

On flooding, most of the site is in Flood Zone 1, the lowest fluvial risk. Land along the eastern boundary is in Flood Zone 3, tied to the Castle Bottom Stream on the far side of Marsh Lane. Groundwater is high, with winter levels found 0.2 metres below the surface, so soakaways will not work and run-off would be discharged to a ditch at a restricted rate. The promoter accepts the earlier sequential test was insufficient and says a robust one will accompany any application.

On bats, the 2015 refusal cited a significant adverse effect on the assemblage using the wider site. Surveys recorded up to nine species. The document argues the assemblage is “not considered to be particularly unusual for this geographical location”, and that most activity is common pipistrelles. It offers dark corridors, bat boxes and reduced light spill. Hart’s ecology officer took a different view last time. Further surveys for dormice, badgers, bats, great crested newts, birds and reptiles are said to be running through 2026.

The site sits within a kilometre of the Thames Basin Heaths Special Protection Area. Unlike in 2015, the greenspace intended to draw walkers away from the heaths already has consent on adjoining land to the east.

The bus claim that has not been corrected

The document’s transport pages lean on two bus routes. It says “regular local bus services, such as the 406 and 145, link Eversley Cross with surrounding towns and key transport hubs, ensuring residents can travel conveniently even without a car”. It gives journey times on the 406 of about ten minutes to Yateley and 26 minutes to Blackwater.

Residents had already challenged that. Obsidian sent a representative to Eversley Parish Council’s meeting on 9 June, in front of sixteen members of the public. Someone there said “the bus route number 406, noted in the handout, is a bus route provided for school children rather than a standard bus route”. The minutes record the reply: “OK that is noted and will be amended accordingly.” (Minutes of Eversley Parish Council, 9 June 2026)

The version lodged with Hart on 21 August is dated January 2026 and still carries the claim.

The public record does not support it either. The two stops in Eversley Cross, both at The Chequers, are served by exactly two routes. Neither is the 406.

  • Route 8, Stagecoach South, Farnborough to California Crossroads. Three journeys a day at The Chequers on weekdays: 08:03 towards Yateley, then 15:25 and 17:11 the other way. Nothing on Saturday or Sunday.
  • Route 145, Horseman Coaches, Three Mile Cross to Winnersh. Tuesdays only. One journey through Eversley Cross, at 10:14, towards Wokingham.

Timetables checked for the week beginning 5 September 2026.

(Bus Times, Eversley Cross)

That is four buses in a normal week. Both timetables are published, and neither lists a 406 at Eversley Cross.

The parish is writing its own plan

Eversley is drafting a Neighbourhood Plan, which if it passes a referendum would carry legal weight in planning decisions. Residents were surveyed in November 2025, and a design code went out for community comment in August. (Eversley Neighbourhood Plan)

Hart validated the Marsh Lane pre-application on 1 September. The parish council met that same evening, with an item on its agenda to “review and approve a Call for Sites as part of the Neighbourhood Plan”. (Agenda, Eversley Parish Council, 1 September 2026)

Marsh Lane is not the only scheme in the parish. Berkeley Homes presented proposals for Firgrove Farm, branded Firgrove Heath, to the same council in January, and Hollybush Farm was raised at the June meeting. Asked in June whether Marsh Lane had been prompted by those, the Obsidian representative said it was being looked at on its own merits. (Major planning applications in Eversley)

What it means for you

You cannot object yet. Pre-application advice is a conversation between a developer and the council. There is no consultation, no site notice and no comment box, and the register shows zero comments on the file. If a planning application follows, that is the point at which the council publishes it for comment and neighbours are notified. Hart warns that comments received after its time limit will not be taken into account. We track the weekly lists on our Fleet planning news page.

You can read the same document the council is reading. The vision document is public on Hart’s register at reference 26/01435/PREAPP, as are the 2015 decision notice and the 2016 costs order. Nothing here comes from anywhere else.

If you want a say before an application lands, the Neighbourhood Plan is the route with actual weight. Eversley Parish Council’s working group takes email at Eversleynp@gmail.com, and its Call for Sites went to the 1 September meeting.

The ward councillors listed on the file are Cllr Spencer Farmer, Cllr Anne Crampton and Cllr Tim Southern, all for Hartley Wintney ward, and the case officer is James Kidger.

Sources