THE future of Low Mill in Addingham could be resolved for good today after developers, owners and planners ironed out their differences over the thorny issue of affordable housing.

Bellway Homes (Yorkshire) has applied for planning permission to build 64 homes on the site of the former wool scouring plant by the River Wharfe.

Bellway will buy the site from the company, Wools Direct, if planning permission is granted by the Keighley Area Planning Panel today. A previous application was withdrawn at the 11th hour because of a wrangle with planners over the number of 'affordable' homes on the site. Bellway has now agreed to provide 17 affordable homes at Low Mill, or 27 per cent of the total number. This is a reduction of three properties from the previous plan.

This means that instead of being sold at market value, eight of the two-bedroom flats will be sold to a registered social landlord to be made available for rent at a discount and nine will be sold at a discounted price of £70,000 each. This figure would remain pegged back at re-sale to make sure the houses remained at an affordable figure.

The idea is that local families without high incomes may not be forced to move out of their home village in search of cheaper housing.

Council officers have recommended that the plan, to convert part of the existing mill into 35 flats and build 23 new houses, plus six more flats, should be granted by panel members.

Addingham Parish Council chairman Gordon Campbell expressed broad support for the plan. He said: "I am glad that site is being redeveloped. If negotiations had collapsed and the site was allowed to deteriorate it would have been difficult for the residents of Low Mill who live near it.

"Providing it is passed, I think everybody concerned will be glad that negotiations have come to an end and progress is being made." He would be happy if the development could be completed by next year.

Addingham Parish Council will not be objecting to the plan despite members having reservations about the resulting traffic situation in the area.

Coun Campbell said: "The reservations we have over access and traffic, we will leave to the experts."

But Coun Campbell insists that the parish council should have some say in the way the affordable units are allocated to owners and tenants. He said a percentage of the affordable homes should be restricted to people who already lived in the village of Addingham.

If the plan gets the go-ahead today it still has another couple of hurdles to pass. Because the site is former industrial land in the green belt, changing it to a housing estate needs to be ratified by the council's regulatory committee and by the Secretary of State for the Environment.

A report to the planning panel says: "The proposal represents very special circumstances to warrant the grant of planning permission for new development in the green belt, namely promoting a significant benefit to the openness of the area by a reduction in the area of the built form."

The plan involves the demolition of mill buildings, oil storage tanks and other 'left overs'.