Residents in a quiet village road have hit out at plans to cut down a “perfectly healthy” tree to make way for a new home for a disabled man.

Proposals have been submitted to build a single storey house especially designed to accommodate a 33-year-old man born with severe disabilities, who currently lives with his father in Maltmans Lane, Chalfont St Peter.

The applicant, who is building the house for his son Warwick Kent, said in the design and access statement that he is worried the current accommodation for his son – a large, two-storey period house – will not provide a “sustainable basis” for his continued care should anything happen to him.

The statement says: “Mr Kent is anxious to ensure that his son shall be able to live independently in his own home, specially designed for his needs and able to accommodate 24-hour on-site support, to avoid the need to rely on local authority provision.

“As such, the proposal is to construct a new single storey detached dwelling on the site and form a new vehicular access from Maltmans Lane to the south, on the land already owned by Mr Kent.”

And a tree, which is on the south edge of the site immediately adjoining Maltmans Lane and subject to a Tree Preservation Order, will have to be removed to make way for the new access road.

The design and access statement adds: “In order to form a new access and driveway from Maltmans Lane to serve the new dwelling, various alternative strategies have been considered but, given the site constraints, it has not been possible to find a design solution to allow for the retention of this tree.

“It is therefore reluctantly proposed that to form a vehicle access, T1 will have to be removed in favour of development.”

But residents, who paid to have the tree’s health checked, insist it needs to remain a part of the road.

Bhav Kotecha said: “It’s a perfectly healthy tree, there’s nothing wrong with it, and we’ve got this guy who wants to take it down.

“We are all against it.”

Residents also do not want the access road being built to the new property, with Mr Kotecha adding: “Maltmans Lane is a busy road and the last thing it needs is another road going off it.”

Speaking about the tree and the new lane in the design and access statement, Mr Kent wrote: “The tree does not provide any screening between sites and although it has amenity value, it is within an area which already has the benefit of a considerable number of other surrounding large trees.

“It is therefore considered that the special circumstance of the benefit of the development on the site will outweigh the loss of one protected tree.

“A single dwelling will not generate a significant volume of vehicle movements and traffic disturbance to neighbours would be minimal.”