SENIOR officers at Scottish Borders Council have launched an investigation following complaints over the handling of a controversial planning application for a Peebles housing development.

A bid to erect 71 houses at South Parks have been met with resistance from community leaders and residents.

Objectors raised concerns regarding stretched infrastructure and fear Peebles is in danger of “gross overdevelopment”.

Another major concern was the access road which will serve the proposed development planned south of Tweed Bridge – Caledonian Road.

Official complaints have now been lodged which centres on various objections about the traffic assessments and road safety audits carried out by house builders Persimmon.

The complainant has identified what he considers to be serious shortcomings in the processes used, which casts doubt on the veracity and accuracy of the various audits and assessments.

When attempts to get answers from Scottish Borders Council regarding the process failed, the objector called for an independent review of the Caledonian Road traffic situation.

This call to action was also echoed by Peebles Community Council which was disappointed to learn that the request had been dismissed by council officers.

The local objector disputes the claim by Scottish Borders Council that Caledonian Road is an urban road capable of taking 1500 cars per hour.

Using Scottish Government guidelines, the complainant says it is a street which has a reduced capacity.

During a meeting of the town’s community council, convenor of the planning sub-committee Les Turnbull, said: “We have been asking elected members through the community council for a truly independent traffic survey to be done on the Caledonian Road. This has not happened.

“However council officers, in response I suspect to many of the objections and the request for an independent survey, have done another review of the objections.

"They have decided that their view is correct and that the original traffic assessment was undertaken by professional staff and that council staff were involved in the scoping of the traffic assessment.

“That said there are no documents on the planning portal that we can find that actually goes into what the scoping exercise actually entailed and what was agreed.

“Suffice to say that a formal complaint has been made by an objector regarding these issues and this is being investigated by council officers.”

A spokesperson for Scottish Borders Council confirmed that two complaints have been received from residents in Peebles in relation to the handling of the planning application for 71 dwellings at South Parks.

They said: "The complaints are currently being investigated by senior managers and will be responded to in due course.”

The application is expected to come before Scottish Borders Council’s planning committee on March 4.