Concerns over sale of historic land at Cooper Bridge

In March councillors approved a plan to allow 42 hectares of land at Cooper Bridge to be developed in its Local Development Framework (LDF).

But campaigners say the council did not make it clear exactly which land was to be built on.

John Barraclough from campaign group Keep Roberttown and Hartshead Rural said: “They called it land Cooper Bridge and that’s a misrepresentation of what it really is.”

Earlier this month Kirklees Estate – which runs from behind The Three Nuns pub in Huddersfield Road to Hartshead – went up for sale.

Estate agent Strutt and Parker said the site would include around 50 hectares of land that had been approved for development in the council’s LDF.

Campaigners said that the council should have made it clear that the Cooper Bridge site would actually include parts of the historic Kirklees Estate.

“The councillors thought the land was basically right next to a sewerage treatment works and a scrapyard, but that’s not the case,” Mr Barraclough said.

He urged Mirfield residents to take part in a public consultation on the LDF, which will be held in due course.

A council spokesman said the boundaries of business development sites would be determined after they had been looked at by a government inspector, and that the name of the Cooper Bridge site was chosen so that people could easily understand which location was involved.