PLANS have been rejected for an additional five new tourist accommodations at a Lake District lodge site.

Plans were submitted for the conversion and change of use of redundant agricultural shed into 3 tourist accommodation units, the siting of an additional freestanding lodge, addition of new external cladding and roof finishes to the redundant shed, as well as associated changes to the site for car parking and landscaping in February of this year.

The plans submitted for the application at Fisherground Lodges, Eskdale said that the new lodges would provide a ‘significant uplift’ in the capacity of the site.

A design and access statement said: “The purpose of this retrofit is to add an additional 5 lodges to the existing 4 lodges providing a significant uplift in the capacity of the site.

“The works would comprise of the demolition in part, of one of the existing buildings and replace this with a newly built, higher quality construction.

“The proposal is to be entirely self-contained within the existing Fisherground Lodge site and will utilize the existing screening along with additional planting where necessary.

“As the majority of the proposed accommodation is using buildings that are already existing there is not a significant increase in the scale of site visually to the surrounding area.”

However, the Lake District Planning Authority rejected the plans on August 21 saying that the new lodges ‘would not maintain local distinctiveness’.

The report also indicated that a bat survey had stated that bat droppings were found within the agricultural building to be converted and that two bat activity surveys would need to be completed to ascertain whether bats were roosting in the building.

The report said these surveys had not been completed with the park authority saying, ‘therefore we have insufficient information to assess whether bats would be harmed as a result of the development’.

A decision notice from the Lake District National Park said: “The proposal would result in an incongruous feature which would harm local landscape character and would not maintain local distinctiveness or sense of place.

“The landscape harm identified is not outweighed by the economic benefits arising from additional short term holiday accommodation within the area.”