A DISUSED public house will NOT be redeveloped as a 30-bedroom hotel. A planning application to demolish the existing Horse and Groom public house on the A505 near Royston has been turned down by South Cambridgeshire District Council. The proposal was sub

A DISUSED public house will NOT be redeveloped as a 30-bedroom hotel.

A planning application to demolish the existing Horse and Groom public house on the A505 near Royston has been turned down by South Cambridgeshire District Council.

The proposal was submitted by the Findlay Duthie Partnership.

The decision to reject the application was taken by planning officers at the district council under delegated powers.

The reasons:

- The hotel would fail to minimise the need to travel by car

- It would be outside of the village frameworks of Litlington and Steeple Morden, and the built up areas of Cambridge and Royston

- The development would have 'a harmful visual impact on the open countryside and landscape'

- There is already an existing application to redevelop the Little Chef site on the Royston bypass as a 36-bedroom motel just two miles away

Keith Hutchinson, of Hutchinsons planning consultants, said: "We are disappointed considering it had a reasonable amount of support from local parish councils and North Herts District Council.

"We saw it as an opportunity to redevelop a site which had become an eyesore.

"We thought it would have been a positive development to the countryside and its surroundings while satisfying a demanding need for the travelling public," he said.

He added the a decision was still to be made on whether to appeal against the decision or submit a revised planning application.

- Plans for a Travel Lodge motel on the Little Chef site were approved in April 2003. The application expires in 2008.