Moore Place Refused: 206 Homes

Moore Place refused: what it means for housing development in Hersham

Elmbridge Borough Council has refused outline plans for 206 homes on the former Moore Place golf course at Esher. The decision was taken after a series of votes, and a revised refusal motion was approved only narrowly.

Moore Place is in Esher, not Hersham, and it has never been counted in our local pipeline figure. The reasoning behind the decision matters here all the same.

What the decision turned on

The site sits in the Green Belt. The applicants, Charterhouse Strategic Land and Moore Place Holdings, argued that the golf course, out of use since 2019, should be treated as grey belt, the national policy route by which poorer quality Green Belt land can be released for housing. Planning officers had recommended approval.

The committee declined to designate the land as grey belt, and without that designation the case for releasing the site fell away. Councillor Simon Waugh told the meeting it came down to whether it was a grey belt site, and in his view it was not.

The scheme would have delivered 103 affordable homes, half the total. It attracted more than 1,000 public objections. Members were genuinely split: officers suggested deferring a decision once the committee deadlocked, councillors rejected that, and the refusal motion followed.

The case for building was put as well as the case against. Councillor Harrison Allman-Varty, pressing members to weigh the borough’s housing shortage, asked “what exactly are we prepared to build?”

Why an Esher decision matters in Hersham

Several of the applications around Hersham involve Green Belt land, and in those cases the argument for release leans on grey belt policy. What Moore Place shows is that the designation is not a formality in this borough. A developer asserting that a site qualifies does not make it so, and members are willing to reach a different conclusion from their own officers.

That is only one strand, though, and it would be a mistake to read every local application through it. The concerns residents have raised across the Hersham sites also cover surface water drainage and flood risk, traffic and road capacity, access and construction routes, school places, GP and dental capacity, loss of trees and habitat, and the cumulative effect of several schemes arriving at once. Those grounds apply whether or not a site is in the Green Belt, and on some of these applications they are the stronger argument.

This may not be the end of it

A refusal is not necessarily the final word. Applicants can appeal, and schemes of this size are often appealed, so the decision should not be treated as settled. A revised application can also come back.

If an appeal were to succeed, the reasoning would cut the other way and could influence how similar sites across the borough are treated, Hersham included. Nothing has been lodged that we are aware of at the time of writing. We will report it if that changes.

Where some of Hersham’s planning applications stand today

These are the live applications on land around the village, as at 15 October 2026. The full record, including approved and completed schemes, is on the tracker page.

Moore Place sits outside Hersham and is shown for context only. It is not included in the local pipeline total. Field Common Lane is an access and traffic matter and is not counted as housing.

Burhill Kennels: comments close tomorrow

Of everything on that list, Burhill Kennels is the one residents can still influence directly. The consultation on application 2026/1902, for up to 82 homes at Turners Lane, closes on 16 October 2026.

If you intend to comment, our summary of the application and the objection points, with the full document to download, is here:
Burhill Kennels, Turners Lane: objection to 2026/1902

The map

Every site is plotted below, with its planning reference and current status.

Map data © OpenStreetMap contributors. Tap or click any marker for the site name, planning reference and details. On phones, use two fingers to move the map. Purple markers are nearby sites outside Hersham, shown for context only and not counted in the local pipeline total.

What this means in practice

One refusal does not decide anything for Hersham. Each application is determined on its own facts and on its own merits, and none of the live local schemes has been to committee yet.

What it does show is that a case can be tested and rejected, even when officers accept it and even when a scheme carries a substantial amount of affordable housing. If you have a view on any of the applications above, whether that is about drainage, traffic, infrastructure, the Green Belt or anything else, the time to put it in writing is while the consultation is open rather than after a decision.

For the full record of every site, its status and its planning reference:
Housing Developments Around Hersham

Reported by the Local Democracy Reporting Service and carried by the BBC and Surrey Live, together with the published officer report for application 2025/3373. Statuses reflect the position on 15 October 2026 and change as applications progress.