A York farm shop facing opposition to its bid for planning permission after its launch has appealed for public support
An application to grant retrospective planning permission to The Farmer’s Cart, at Oakwood Farm near Strensall has been lodged with York Council.
The shop called on people to back its efforts to continue providing healthy Yorkshire food to the local community.
But an objector described as an interested party said the farm should have got planning permission before opening the shop and also raised transport concerns.
The application from Chris Jeffery would see the farm shop granted a certificate of lawfulness to continue operating if it is approved.
The Farmer’s Cart first opened in November.
It is housed in two portable cabins with produce on display on stalls under gazebos.
The shop sells produce from the working farm which also supplies several Yorkshire businesses including crisp and cheese makers, a bakery, confectioner and jam and yogurt producers.
It also hosts the Milk Box York independent drinks makers.
There are also plans to expand the farm’s output with the production of lamb, beef and pork reared on site along with honey, wool and other products, according to the application.
Plans stated the modest shop was bringing substantial economic benefits and came as farmers were looking to diversify their operations.
It added the shop also had community benefits including supplying produce for activities at local schools, food donations and opportunities for businesses to operate at the site.
The shop said in a Facebook post it needed support to help see off the objection to the application.
It said: “When we started this in November, we had no idea how popular it would be.
“Thanks to you all it has become so busy and so we want to continue doing this because we love seeing you all enjoying our farm, our animals and our fresh fruit and vegetables.
“We only want to provide a healthy source of Yorkshire food, Yorkshire service and a Yorkshire community in our own small way.”
But the objector said the shop was too far away from where local people live and lacked safe and practical walking routes, posing road safety risks to visitors.
They added the shop should be subject to a planning condition requiring it to only sell goods produced on the farm to stop it from bringing in products made elsewhere.
The objector said: “The shop will likely never sell more goods produced on the holding than imported so cannot be considered to be a farm shop.
“The time taken to walk from Haxby to the shop would be 47 minutes, carrying shopping would increase this further.
“There is no mains electricity to the site and installation would likely be prohibitively expensive, the generator currently used to provide electricity to the shop constitutes a noise nuisance.”
You can read and comment on the planning application here.
