THE first stage of an application to build 500 new homes off Centurion Way has been lodged with Cheshire East Council.

Manchester-based Mosaic Town Planning has submitted plans for an Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) screening opinion, a preliminary planning stage which gauges the potential impact on the town.

Plans are detailed as a mixed use development consisting of ‘church/community, commercial uses yet to be defined, up to 500 houses and associated open space’ where Centurion Way meets Holmes Chapel Road.

After this initial screening stage, plans can be submitted for public consultation and then for consideration by a planning committee.

Concerns about the site’s location and potential traffic impact have already been voiced.

Cllr David Williams, Middlewich Town Council member, said: “There is a frustration. I know there is a need for housing but we have to put infrastructure with it.

“We have not had any major improvements for years and years. They are putting a huge amount of pressure on a road that already has its fair share of problems – it is queuing already and this is a recipe for gridlock.”

Despite partially lying within Cheshire West and Chester Council’s jurisdiction, the application has been lodged on Cheshire East Council’s planning portal.

If successful, the site would expand Middlewich to the north east, towards the M6, adding a further 500 homes onto the more than 1000 currently proposed or being built around the town.

The revised total of new Middlewich homes would stand north of 1750, including four sites off Warmingham Lane and one apiece off Booth Lane, Croxton Lane and Jersey Way.

The 2011 census revealed Middlewich’s population as 13,595 people, occupying just shy of 6000 registered dwellings.

Mosaic Town Planning declined to comment on the application at this early stage. Consultation dates will be published in due course.

The planning application initially named Middlewich Town Council clerk Jonathan Williams and Cheshire East Council ward members, Cllrs Bernice Walmsley, Simon McGrory and Mike Parsons, as consultees.

This was confirmed as an administrative error and has since been removed from the screening application - there is no need for consultation at this stage in the planning process.