Man behind £5m Goathland honeybee project says it'll be a 'terrific shame' if it falls at planning hurdle

The man behind a £5 million not-for-profit project for Goathland inspired by the honeybee says he's not put off after planners recommended the plans for refusal at a meeting next week.


James Fearnley whose fascination with honeybees began back in 1990, wants to build an exhibition and bee discovery centre plus research facility behind his home, a Grade 2 listed former shooting lodge in the village made famous as the location for the ITV series Heartbeat.


The design of the "BeeArc" would be based on a honeycomb, with a number of hexagonal shaped structures, following land contours, which would be single storey above ground and flat-roofed.




Part of the land is currently used as an overflow car park and is adjacent to the National Park car park.

If the Heartbeat visitors need increasingly long memories to remember when the show was just about the most popular television drama in Britain, Goathland’s starring role in an even bigger screen hit Harry Potter brings much younger fans to the village.



Mr Fearnley, who has a business which makes herbal medicines, and for the past 14 years run a social enterprise which operates a dispensary, bakery and library in Whitby, said the plans had emerged out of 35 years of research into medicines from the beehive.



The centre would be run by a charity and employ around 15 people, who’d be expected to live locally. It is expected to attract around 30,000 visitors a year - a fraction of the 1.2m visitors who came to Goathland in 1996. Nearly 30 years on, visitor numbers are less than half.


Mr Fearnley said: "There would be an award-winning exhibition around honey bees and about their incredible significance for human beings.



"BeeArc is like a portal through which people can come, find out engage and become involved."

The design of the "BeeArc" would be based on a honeycomb, with a number of hexagonal shaped structures, following land contours, which would be single storey above ground and flat-roofed.


There would be research, education and training into areas ranging from traditional beekeeping, alternative technology to transpersonal psychology. Also events and conferences - but these would not be large-scale, attracting only up to 250 people a day at peak times of year.


Its footprint has reduced to around the size of two tennis courts as a result of lengthy discussions with planning officials, he said. However planners at the North York Moors National Park Authority have given seven grounds for refusal ahead of Thursday’s meeting. As well as an objection from the parish council, there have been around 60 from residents, whose concerns range from traffic, lighting to overdevelopment.


A public meeting in May saw dozens voice objections to the proposals, but Mr Fearnley said they’d recorded positive feedback at public information days: "I feel I have a responsibility to carry on with it. It is making a statement, it's offering an opportunity for a conversations that we need to have.



"The core mission of the National Park is the same as ours. To develop the environmental, social, economic and cultural life of those who live in the park, that’s what we are about.
James Fearnley


"I'm not going to be brow-beaten by the vitriolic quality of some of the responses. There's lots of people out there who would love the project.


"I think it’d be a terrific shame if it doesn't happen and we shall certainly appeal - a project of this kind is 100 per cent within the mission of National Parks.”