Hi, I’m Chris Scott, and I run Horton Common along with my father, Robert. Horton Common is based in the Staffordshire Moorlands on top of a ridge location known as Lask Edge. My family has been caravaning since I was a child, and over the years we often discussed setting up a small site for caravans and motorhomes so guests could experience the amazing views of the Peak District National Park in the distance. Horton Common caters primarily for caravans and motorhomes with our fully serviced pitches. While we do not have toilet/shower facilities on-site, we do have a few campers who bring their own toilet facilities with them.
Table of Contents
Setting Up Horton Common
In 2013 I started going through the process of securing the necessary planning permissions to install the facilities for Horton Common, including a new power supply and mains water connection.
As you can see from the image below, we put in 5 service posts and water pipes to each pitch so they could be fully serviced.
The amount of work to set up the site was significant. However, our approach to setting up Horton Common was simple.
Put all the features into Horton Common, which we, as caravanners, would want on our ideal small site.
Therefore, they include an entrance stepped back from the road as well as fully serviced pitches with 16A power and an easy-to-use CDP (Chemical Disposal Point).
Winning Best CS 2015
In 2015 we were very proud that after all our hard work, a significant number of our guests had voted us the Best CS in the Camping and Caravanning Clubs’ annual small site awards for us to be shortlisted.
The club then reviews the sites on the shortlist for the various awards.
We not only won in the individual category of Best New CS, but we also won the overall award of Best CS 2015.
To say that I was shocked by this after setting up our site just one year prior would have been a massive understatement. The video below is the club filmed on the day they presented us with our award.
The Camping and Caravanning Club also requested that we be a case study for new potential small site owners on what’s involved in the process of setting up a site.
While planning permission is not required for a site of 5 caravans/motorhomes (that permission comes from the club), planning permission was required for much of the engineering works required to set up Horton Common.
That included the power/electrical cables, CDP, road and hardstanding pitches.
Horton Common Improvements
When we originally set up Horton Common in 2014, we installed a land drain to try and improve surface water drainage.
However, the wet winters told us that we would need to install a road and hardstanding pitches for our guests so the site could remain open no matter how wet it got.
So at the end of 2015, I secured planning permission for the road and hard-standing pitches. After a lot of digging and 200 tonnes of stone later and we had our road and hardstanding pitches, ready for the rain.
We continue to improve the site year after year. For instance, in the summer 2019, in collaboration with the local council, we now have a defibrillator at the entrance to our site, which you can read more about here.
Its part of a scheme to improve quick access to defibrillator devices for the public and, obviously for our guests here at Horton Common.
We look forward to seeing our repeat guests each year, and we are hoping to be able to cater to more guests in the future.
If you are interested in coming to visit us here at Horton Common, please check out our reviews and booking form.
Thanks for reading,
Cheers, Chris
What I’m Working On…
I’ve written many articles over the years on our blog about the latest and greatest caravans, motorhome and caravans. However, reading individual articles can be time-consuming.
Therefore, I’ve decided I’m going to produce a single page with a searchable database of the latest new model. I need somewhere to test it before its ready, so below is what I’m working on.
[table id=2 /]