Proposals to build 5,000 eco-homes on the former drift mine site were unanimously rejected by Leeds City Region – made up of key councillors across Yorkshire – in Harrogate on June 13.

Feelings are running high about plans to impose an eco-town on the land and protesters are gearing up to fight should developers and builders move into the area. But this will not be the first 'Battle of Gascoigne Wood'.

Down a narrow country lane leading to a coal processing plant in summer 1984, striking miners let cows out of nearby fields and, hiding behind them, launched clods of earth at oncoming policemen.

Watching the battle and worrying over her cows was Jean Marshall, whose family has farmed the land close to Sherburn for more than a century.

Gascoigne Wood plant opened in 1978, at its peak processing 11 million tonnes of coal each year brought via 124 miles of underground roadways, but was shut in 2002 after becoming increasingly unprofitable.

Slowly the slag heaps were grassed over and, while the processing sheds remain in place, they lie derelict and forlorn, surrounded by acres of deep green fields, noiseless save for the small aircraft taking off from the adjacent aerodrome.

But it may not remain that way for long. Despite the firm decision of Leeds City Region leaders to reject proposals to site an eco-town there, Ministers will have the final say and an army of developers and builders could soon be found down that narrow lane.

If that's the case, though, this time the farmers, home-owners and businessmen located the length of New Lennerton Lane won't just be standing by as the battle rages beyond them.

Mrs Marshall said she was terrified when trouble-makers in 1984 threatened to burn her straw and destroy her land as the police advanced on the picket line, but added the Government's desire to build an eco-town at the edge of her land made her even more angry.

"We're not very pleased about this. In fact we can't bear the thought of it," she said. "It makes me very, very upset. We've farmed this land for years and worked hard to make it a success but, if this town comes up to our back door, we'd have to move out.

"If the government thinks this is a good location for a town, they're not in touch with reality. They want to create a characterless town, miles from anywhere on prime farming land. It just doesn't make sense."

With 40,000 aircraft movements each year, Sherburn Aerodrome further down the road is more busy than Doncaster's Robin Hood Airport.

But chairman Adrian White (right) said building a new town next door would make it almost impossible to continue to use any of its four runways – ruining a recent £500,000 investment.

"I'm not sure we'd be able to stay here; I think it would be doubtful. I don't think a new town should be built anywhere in Selby district because I can't see any benefits to building it here," he said.

"Why have people commute 50 miles to Leeds and back when we could regenerate brownfield areas of the cities? We've spent a lot of money on this aerodrome and we have a long lease here.

"We employ 50 people and offer a pastime that 700 local people wish to participate in so we shall be opposing this development vehemently."

Robert Stoker, who farms 600 acres, much of it rented from UK Coal and now designated part of the eco-town site, said the area was unsuited to new development.

"The traffic was bad enough when it was just coal trucks but this road is totally unsuited for a new town. They would have to build a new road over the aerodrome, which is hardly environmentally friendly.

"What's more, all this land floods in winter. There are restrictions for what can be done on it in place and I need special flood insurance for my bungalow. It's great land for crops – what we call four tonne per acre land for wheat – but far from perfect for a new town."

And Karen Leeder, who lives in one of the few homes in the area not on farmland, said: "Everything we do we have to drive to – that's why we've got two vehicles. How can they call what they want to build here an eco-town when everyone will have to drive everywhere? That's hardly environmentally sustainable.

"This is a nice area, very quiet. I know times move on and there's a huge need for affordable housing at the moment, but I can't see how any rational person can think this is an ideal site for that."