Jeremy Clarkson could be set to face yet another council showdown as he looks to improve the car parks at his Cotswolds pub.
The presenter wants to increase parking spaces and plant trees at his two car parks at the Farmer’s Dog with visitor numbers greatly increasing since he took over the pub in August.
But complaints over traffic and even the direction of a swinging gate have been raised as part of a consultation.
The car park, which has capacity for 170 cars, has already come under scrutiny because it is next to a historic grave.
There has been growing local pressure to close it after suggestions that a neighbouring 1,400-year-old burial mound containing the remains of an Anglo-Saxon warlord could be damaged by the increasing number of cars now arriving.
Clarkson has submitted a planning application for the ‘retention’ of works to increase the number of parking spaces for visitors and to ‘formalise’ staff parking.
Oxfordshire County Council said it raised no objection but if the district council deemed the car parking ‘not to be an established use’, Clarkson would have to submit another planning application.
The council said the gate must ‘open inwards within the property as opposed to outwards to reduce any potential conflict within the public highway.’
It also raised issues over visibility at the exit, the risk of flooding and traffic.
A spokesperson said: ‘Taking account of the site’s potential levels of traffic generation and higher levels of parking demand, it is requested that a Traffic Management Method Statement (TMMS) be suitably conditioned if consent were to be granted.’
The presenter spent £1million to take charge of The Farmer’s Dog which is close to his base in the hugely popular Clarkson’s Farm TV show and has spoken of how expensive the project has been – but he’s dependent on car users to have any hope of keeping it solvent.
Clarkson’s planning agent said upgraded facilities were ‘much needed’ and the application should be approved ‘without delay’.
As soon as Clarkson acquired the pub lease he knew he needed to increase its parking capacity – because of what happened previously when he opened his hugely popular Diddly Squat Farm Shop near Chadlington.
Fans soon came in their hundreds causing traffic jams with punters parked for miles around on the grass verges of narrow single-tracks, blocking roads and causing fury among neighours.
The planning agent said the car park is currently overflowing which could harm the ‘scenic beauty of the area’ if not improved.
In the application they wrote that Clarkson’s plans ‘seek to retain two areas of surfacing that have been provided within the site.
‘Both areas are within the area within which the existing planning permission extends and the act of parking cars itself is not one which requires permission.’
‘The western surfacing is within an area that is well screened from surrounding views by existing vegetation and it thus is not largely visible from outside the site.
‘In a similar vein, due to the fact it is at ground level, the eastern parking surface is only visible from outside the site from the highway immediately to the east.
‘The proposals include the provision of new planting to ensure the natural and scenic beauty of the area is protected, This includes tree planting around the western parking area to bolster the existing trees in this location and hedgerow gapping up and tree planting to the east.
‘Maximising the availability of parking within the site is a priority for the operators as this assists in preventing overspill parking outside the site which if unregulated has the potential to impact detrimentally on the scenic beauty of the area.’
The new showdown could be bad news for Clarkson as he prepares for the predicted boost in customers to The Farmers’ Dog which will come with the release of the new series of Amazon Prime’s Clarkson’s Farm in the Spring.
The series is understood to heavily feature the opening of the pub.
The TV presenter – who recently had a heart operation due to stress – recently spoke of how desperate the pub trade was, listing a range of difficulties he has had since opening.
Clarkson wrote how his pub – run only on British produce – is a ‘total disaster’ behind the scenes as thefts, traffic chaos and toilet nightmares run rampant.
When the Farmer’s Dog first opened in Oxfordshire in August many had travelled from far and wide to the picturesque spot for a chance of a pint, with the car park rammed within an hour of its opening.
