Three live applications on Allum Lane would put 336 homes and retirement flats on Green Belt between Elstree and Borehamwood, plus a new Schopwick Practice surgery.
A third housing application has been registered on Allum Lane, the road that runs between Elstree village and the western edge of Borehamwood. All three sites are Metropolitan Green Belt. All three are awaiting a decision. Together they would put 336 homes and retirement flats on fields that currently separate the two places.
The newest is 26/1112/OUT, registered on 5 August 2026. It seeks outline permission for up to 50 homes on 2.032 hectares south of Allum Lane, with everything reserved except the new access.
Nobody has to look at those three schemes together, because the planning system does not require it. Read side by side, they are the difference between a lane with houses on one side and a continuous built edge from Borehamwood to Elstree.
The three live applications
| Reference | Site | What is proposed | Registered | Status |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| 26/1112/OUT | Land south of Allum Lane | Up to 50 homes, 50% affordable, outline | 5 Aug 2026 | Awaiting decision |
| 24/0442/FUL | Land south of Allum Lane (east) | 150 retirement living units, facilities building and a doctors' surgery | 28 Mar 2024 | Awaiting decision |
| 26/0318/OUT | Land north of Allum Lane | Up to 136 homes with allotments, outline | 10 Mar 2026 | Awaiting decision |
The registered description for 26/0318/OUT still says up to 136 dwellings. The planning statement submitted with the newest application states that the north side scheme has since been amended to 150 units. We have used the register figure, because that is the number formally before the council.
A fourth site has already gone through. Eight three-bedroom detached homes at Elle Dani Farm, on the western boundary of the newest site, were resolved for approval at Hertsmere’s Planning Committee on 15 January 2026, with the section 106 deed agreed on 28 April 2026.
What the newest application asks for
The applicant is ACRE Elstree Limited, together with two individual landowners. The site is a single field, described in the planning statement as greenfield land no longer in agricultural use but mown by the owner, with a mature oak in the middle and a public right of way, Elstree & Borehamwood FP 6, along the south-eastern edge. A cemetery and the recycling centre sit behind it.
The scheme would provide:
- up to 50 homes, including 50 per cent affordable housing
- about 9,107 square metres of open space with public access
- a village green built around the retained oak
- a maximum height of two and a half storeys
- a single new vehicular access from Allum Lane, the only detail submitted for approval now
- sustainable drainage, play areas and new planting
Everything else, including the layout, the appearance and the actual number of houses, would be settled later at reserved matters.
The Green Belt argument
The site is in the Metropolitan Green Belt, where inappropriate development is refused unless very special circumstances exist. The applicant does not rely on that test. It argues the land is grey belt under paragraph 155 of the National Planning Policy Framework, as revised in 2024, which removes the Green Belt harm from the balance if the land does not strongly serve the Green Belt’s purposes and the scheme meets the government’s Golden Rules.
The 50 per cent affordable housing is the load-bearing part of that case. The planning statement cites it directly as evidence that the Golden Rules in paragraphs 155 and 156 are met.
The council’s own heritage adviser objects to the effect
Hertsmere buys its historic buildings advice from Place Services at Essex County Council. Its response on the newest application, dated 21 August 2026, is the sharpest document on the file.
It accepts that the site sits far enough from most listed buildings not to affect them. It does not accept the rest. The site, it says, “forms part of the undeveloped landscape buffer surrounding the village” and helps preserve Elstree’s “historic sense of separation from the surrounding urban areas of Borehamwood and Barnet”. Development would be “intrusive”, would “erode part of the rural setting” of the Elstree Village Conservation Area, and “would further diminish the distinction between the historic village and the surrounding suburban environment”.
Its conclusion is that the outline proposal would fail to preserve the setting of the Grade II listed Church of St Nicholas under section 66(1) of the Planning (Listed Buildings and Conservation Areas) Act 1990. It rates the harm as “very low” to the church and “low” to the conservation area.
One detail in that response is worth flagging. The adviser notes that the illustrative masterplan shows 38 dwellings, not the up to 50 the application seeks. Because all detailed matters are reserved, it says the full visual and heritage impact “cannot be fully assessed at this stage”.
Other consultees have been less troubled. Active Travel England replied on 13 August that it has no comment, because the scheme falls below its statutory thresholds. Hertsmere’s own environmental protection team has flagged three issues: traffic noise from Allum Lane, noise from the recycling centre, and contaminated land. It says the noise assessment shows homes nearest the road will need “a significantly high standard of sound insulation” to meet BS 8233 internal levels.
The GP surgery in the middle of it
The retirement community application, 24/0442/FUL, carries the piece of this most likely to affect people who will never live on any of these sites. It includes a new doctors’ surgery beside Allum Lane, intended as the new home of the Schopwick Practice, which currently operates from Elstree village.
The applicant’s planning statement says the surgery project already has sign-off from NHS Hertfordshire and West Essex Integrated Care Board and an approved NHS business case. The surgery would have its own car park at the rear for staff and patients. That application was registered in March 2024 and has been awaiting a decision since, through several rounds of amended plans, the most recent lodged in June 2026.
What it means for you
All three applications are open on Hertsmere’s planning register, and all three can still be commented on while they remain undetermined.
- Search the reference at the council’s planning register and use the Comments tab
- Comments must be about planning matters: openness of the Green Belt, highway safety, noise, drainage, heritage setting and infrastructure all count
- Property values, loss of a private view and competition to an existing business do not
- Anyone can comment, whether or not they were sent a neighbour letter
If you want to speak when one reaches committee, that is a separate step. Hertsmere takes speaker requests by phone on the day of the meeting only, on 020 8207 7550 between 10am and 4pm, with three minutes each for one speaker in support and one against.
Two of these three sites also sit inside a bigger argument. Hertsmere is drafting a new Local Plan that has to find room for far more housing than its adopted plan allows, and the borough’s Green Belt is where most of the candidate land is. What happens on Allum Lane will be read as a signal for the rest of it.
Related
- Borehamwood planning news: the Local Plan candidate sites and what the borough is being asked to build.
- Potters Bar: 293 flats bypass the council: the first Hertsmere scheme sent straight to the Planning Inspectorate.
- Borehamwood roadworks and travel: live closures across Hertsmere, including the A411 at Elstree.
Sources
- Hertsmere Borough Council planning register, applications 26/1112/OUT, 24/0442/FUL and 26/0318/OUT, for the descriptions, dates and statuses in the table.
- Planning Statement for 26/1112/OUT, prepared by hgh Consulting for ACRE Elstree Limited, August 2026, for the site area, the 50 homes and 50 per cent affordable housing, the open space figure, the grey belt case and the planning history.
- Historic Buildings and Conservation Advice for 26/1112/OUT, Place Services, Essex County Council, 21 August 2026, for the conservation area and listed church assessment and the 38-dwelling masterplan figure.
- Active Travel England consultation response, 13 August 2026, and Hertsmere Environmental Protection consultee comments, 26 August 2026, both on the 26/1112/OUT file.
- Planning Statement for 24/0442/FUL, for the 150 retirement living units, the Schopwick Practice relocation and the NHS Hertfordshire and West Essex ICB sign-off.
All documents cited are on the applications’ own pages on the Hertsmere planning register, under the Documents tab. Figures and statuses were checked there on 27 August 2026.
Have your say