Proposed new car park for The Lost Gardens of Heligan in 'Island Field'

  • 8th May 2025

The Lost Gardens of Heligan is proposing to create a new car park on our estate, in a field known as 'Island Field', and we have applied to Cornwall Council for planning permission.

Image: Island Field - The Lost Gardens of Heligan

We are keen to engage with the local community and answer any questions about the development. We will be hosting open drop-in sessions in the Heligan Kitchen with our Managing Director, Laura Chesterfield, for anyone interested in the proposals. The next one will take place on:

Friday 9th May, 5pm to 6.30pm

We met with our immediate neighbours and the Parish Council prior to submitting the application to discuss the plans.

The aim is to hear views on the proposals which may allow us to make changes where appropriate.

Bluebells In The Lost Valley

Why do you need a new car park?

The Lost Gardens of Heligan needs a new car park to:

  1. Provide free parking to all our visitors
  2. Protect local jobs, both at Heligan and in the community
  3. Promote sustainable travel, through the addition of EV chargers in an area with very few

Why haven't you reached an agreement with the owners of the overflow car park?

We are still in negotiations with Lobbs Farm Shop and are hopeful for a positive outcome but they are currently charging for parking in their car park, used as an overflow for Heligan visitors on busier days.

We believe that there should be free parking for our visitors, to ensure this we are considering options to extend the parking provision within Heligan Estate. 

How much has Heligan paid for visitor use of the overflow car park?

In previous years we have paid £48,000 per year for Heligan visitors to use the overflow car park free of charge. Last year we paid £110,000 to the Lobbs so Heligan visitors could park there for free.

During our negotiations, we have so far been presented with proposals which both considerably increase this fee and impose parking charges directly on visitors.

Update following St Ewe Parish Council Extraordinary Meeting

On Wednesday April 30, team members from The Lost Gardens of Heligan, led by chief executive David Harland, attended a meeting of St Ewe Parish Council at which our application for planning permission for a car park in Island Field was discussed. David presented the case for the car park to the councillors - essentially that it will allow Heligan to control its own parking provision and maintain free parking for visitors as charges are being imposed in the Lobbs Farm Shop car park. He expressed a desire for a positive outcome in the negotiations with the Lobb family but made it clear that the imposition of parking charges is a move that potentially endangers the Heligan business and the hundreds of local jobs that rely on its success, both directly employed by Heligan and in related businesses in the community.

Councillors and members of the public expressed concerns about the application, primarily on the grounds of road safety and the site's location in the Cornwall National Landscape, and shared the Heligan desire for negotiations to continue and for a mutually beneficial outcome to be reached.

Heligan's responses to these points are as follows:

  1. Road safety. The statutory consultation from the highways department has raised no objections to the application but councillors felt further analysis of the site with regards to road safety was necessary so decided to lodge a formal objection pending another inspection. The safety of all road users is paramount and The Lost Gardens of Heligan will support any further inspections or analysis needed to reassure decision-makers and members of the public that this proposal is safe. We hope that St Ewe Parish Council will reconsider their objection in light of a new highways inspection.

  2. Cornwall National Landscape. There has been concern in the community around a new car park in the Cornwall National Landscape, formerly known as the Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty or AONB. The border for the National Landscape bisects the main Heligan car park and the Lobbs Farm Shop car park with Island Field falling just inside the boundary and the Lobbs car park just outside. The National Landscape is not a barrier to development but does require special considerations to be made in planning applications to ensure they are sensitive to their surroundings. Our proposal meets these requirements and that the site's placement within the National Landscape shouldn't prevent the application being approved. From a regulatory and planning point of view, there is negligible difference between being directly adjacent to a National Landscape - as the Lobbs car park is - and being within it.

  3. Continued negotiations. We have been in active negotiations since the original 25-year lease expired and are open to ideas to advance these negotiations in a mutually beneficial way. We would like to find a solution which allows Heligan to cover the cost of parking for our visitors rather than charges being imposed directly on visitors and would welcome any mediation that enables us to reach a solution under those terms and within the realms of the financial reality of the overflow carpark’s value. 
Heligan Gardens Island Field Scaled Drawing

Planning Application with Cornwall Council

To read the full planning application submitted by The Lost Gardens of Heligan to Cornwall Council, please follow the link below. 

Planning Application

FAQs

This car park will help us future-proof the Heligan site and also provide crucial charging infrastructure for electric vehicles, something that is not possible in our existing car park.

The chosen site allows easy, safe access to Heligan and will ensure that we are able to continue to deliver our longstanding provision of car parking free of charge to our visitors, something we feel is vital during a cost-of living crisis and at a time when the Cornwall visitor economy is facing considerable challenges.

The field is used for silage and has no significant flora other than grass. Heligan will go beyond its statutory obligations to increase biodiversity as part of this proposal through a significant tree-planting programme elsewhere on its estate as well as planting up the hedging around Island Field to reduce any visual impact.

The Cornwall National Landscape (formerly Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty) covers nearly 30 per cent of Cornwall and is an important mechanism to protect the natural landscape of our county. All special considerations regarding development within a National Landscape are addressed in our planning application and this development will result an increase of local biodiversity due to a significant tree-planting  programme elsewhere on the Heligan site.

The Island Field site sits between the main road into Heligan and the Heligan Caravan and Camping Site and views of the site from within the surrounding area are limited due to undulating topography and presence of vegetation and development.

Heligan will deliver more than the required biodiversity net gain by planting trees in another part of the Heligan estate. Heligan has a longstanding commitment to enhancing the biodiversity of the estate and the surrounding area. In recent times, we have planted more than 100 trees, engaged in site-wide hedge planting and introduced glow-worms, water voles and beavers to Heligan. We are also developing a new red squirrel habitat.

Data gathered from Cornwall Council on accidents in the area between January 2019 and December 2023 (the most recent available) show that three accidents occurred in that period at different locations and with different causes. All three were classified as having an injury severity of “slight”. No accidents were recorded at the existing field access point.

This demonstrates that there is no evidence to suggest any existing road safety issues in the vicinity of the site. Highway Development  Management have raised no objection to this application in their statutory consultation.

We don’t anticipate this being the case. This development is about accommodating a similar volume of cars to that which we currently welcome in a smarter and more efficient way, as well as being able to offer EV charging for the first time.

We propose to install a new T-junction at the existing field access location. The existing access will be upgraded, to provide a 4.8m wide carriageway, ensuring safe entry and exit and good visibility in both directions.

A new accessible and dedicated footpath from the car park to the Heligan entrance will be provided to ensure that no visitors are required to walk alongside the road.

Installing EV charging in an affordable and low impact way requires close proximity to electrical infrastructure. Island Field is closer to National Grid infrastructure than our existing car park is so is the best location for EV charging.

Heligan encourages its visitors to use sustainable modes of transport to visit. The site is directly linked to National Cycle Route Number 3, which provides a safe and virtually traffic-free link from Mevagissey,
Pentewan and St Austell. There is also a public bus stop within the main entrance of Heligan and a permissive footpath through the neighbouring caravan park, providing on foot links to the wider environment.

These plans predate the Lobbs decision to charge for use of its car park, which has been used as an overflow car park for Heligan visitors on busier days. The development of this car park will ensure we can
continue to deliver our longstanding provision of car parking free of charge to our visitors, something we feel is vital during a cost-of-living crisis and at a time when the Cornwall visitor economy is facing considerable challenges.

No, this is untrue. 

The maintenance and upkeep of the car park was a Heligan responsibility under the terms of our agreement with the Lobbs and we always ensured that it was looked after to the same high standard as the Heligan site.

We consider the negotiations with Lobbs and the proposed development of Island Field as separate issues, although the potential imposition of parking charges by Lobbs has highlighted the importance of the Island Field development.

The provision of extra parking as well as crucial electric vehicle charging infrastructure is vital to future-proofing Heligan and so the application will continue regardless of the outcome of the Lobbs negotiations.

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