DELAYS in starting work on a new doctors' surgery in Stow has promoted a rival developer to make an alternative application.

Maugersbury developer John Nutbourne had his plans for a state-of-the-art surgery on the gypsy field, off Oddington Road, turned down last July in favour of an adjacent plot at Tall Trees.

Both sets of plans were presented to planning committee members at Cotswold District Council last summer but they favoured the Tall Trees site, owned by Jenny Scarsbrook, because there was no enabling housing proposed though both are located with the AONB.

A number of councillors had said they would have approved the gypsy site if there had been no housing.

Mr Nutbourne said the five houses were required for his original plans to offset the cost of buying the whole of the field.

Now he is ready to submit another application after securing a deal so the facility could be built without houses.

"The owners of the field have said they are willing to sell two acres, rather than the whole field which they wanted to do originally.

"This means the houses will not be required and the planning application will be for the surgery only.

"The reason it was turned down in the past was because the planning committee was opposed to the additional houses and because the town desperately needs a new surgery the Tall Trees site was passed."

He also pointed out that his application has an added bonus of emerging onto Oddington Road, while the Tall Trees site emerges onto Maugersbury Road which is narrower and dangerous in winter.

Both applicants had submitted plans for a similarly-sized surgery facility.

Mr Nutbourne said he still believes the gypsy field site is the best option because it will allow room for expansion and says Tall Trees will not. He said the current Well Lane surgery has proved that a site can quickly become cramped and as Stow grows in population there will certainly be a need to expand any new surgery to meet future demands.

"No work has been started on Tall Tres yet and my plans are ready to go. NHS funding was secured originally and could easily be transferred. I have written to the GPs asking for a meeting. If my new application is passed, work could start almost straight away," he said.

Tall Trees architect Andrew Eastabrook said: “We’ve made significant progress over the past few months. Planning permission has been given for access, siting, layout and landscape. The only reserved matter pending is appearance and that application is currently with Cotswold District Council for consideration.

“Funding for the new surgery was approved by the NHS’s Clinical Care Commissioning Group last week and the lease details are currently being finalised. We envisage that construction work could start as early as June 2016 with a build time of around six to nine months.”