Final approval for 190 homes on the edge of Ipswich has been given, just one month after developers were tasked with improving proposals.

Mid Suffolk District Council's development control committee on Wednesday gave the green light for plans by Bellway Homes to develop land off Old Norwich Road on the outskirts of Ipswich, deferred from last month.

Councillors in January dubbed the reserved matters around landscape, appearance, scale, design and layout as "poorly conceived", raising particular concerns over 31 homes having tandem parking spaces one in front of the other, drainage worries, and the layout of the roundabout at the site's entrance which it was feared could pose a danger to cyclists.

Bellway returned this week with improvements, which were approved by six votes to one.

Ipswich Star: Mid Suffolk District Council development control committee chairman Matthew Hicks said the committee's request for developers to improve plans for 190 homes near Ipswich had been successfulMid Suffolk District Council development control committee chairman Matthew Hicks said the committee's request for developers to improve plans for 190 homes near Ipswich had been successful

Committee chairman Matthew Hicks said it "shows the power of the committee to ask an applicant to go away and reconsider" elements of their schemes to drive improvements.

Laura Dudley-Smith, agent on behalf of Bellway said that "all instances of triple parking have been removed apart from one" and said that "the drainage strategy was informed by the existing site conditions and topography, and approved by Suffolk County Council as the lead flood authority".

On the junction, she added: "Bellway Homes cannot be expected to take forward a proposal that cannot be supported by the highways authority, Suffolk County Council. As such, we have proposed further improvements to the roundabout arrangement to ensure a level of safety for all users, including cyclists, that goes beyond that already considered acceptable by Suffolk County."

Ipswich Star: Land off Old Norwich Road near Ipswich due to be developed for 190 homesLand off Old Norwich Road near Ipswich due to be developed for 190 homes (Image: GOOGLE MAPS)

In its approval, the council requested that potential culverts underneath Old Norwich Road that could assist water drainage were explored, and assurances that building work on the site would not create new flooding problems.

Objector Steve Bates asked for guarantees that affected residents already living close to the development area would be compensated in future if drainage problems were exacerbated, and questioned the roundabout junction which he said "makes no sense whatsoever, either in terms of road safety or pollution".

The plans were part of a wider outline proposal for 300 homes rejected by the council in 2018, but the Planning Inspectorate granted approval on appeal for 190 of those homes.