Redevelopment plans for the former Golders Green Police Station site have been rejected.

Proposals were put to Barnet council for a five-storey building, consisting of nine flats, behind the main station building on Finchley Road.

Two buildings would have been demolished, although the front building would have remained intact.

But the plans were rejected by the Finchley and Golders Green area planning committee last night due to traffic concerns in Temple Gardens, a narrow road behind the site.

Hampstead Garden Suburb councillor John Marshall said: “Any additional traffic would cause further problems. The residents of Temple Gardens already have plenty of problems with traffic and parking. That was the hub of the argument.”

Cllr Marshall added: “What the applicants can now do is go back to the drawing board and say, we have listened to the committee and residents, and draw up a scheme so no additional traffic goes down Temple Gardens.

“If they had done that, they would have got planning consent.”

The police station was shut in 2013 and sold by the Mayor’s Office for Policing and Crime to save money.