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ID sylw: 107270

Derbyniwyd: 07/03/2025

Ymatebydd: Cotswolds National Landscape Board

In principle, the Cotswolds National Landscape (CNL) Board agrees with the approach laid out in Draft Policy Direction 14.
Of particular relevance to the CNL are the proposed Major Investment Sites (MIS) at Long Marston Airfield (MIS.2) and Long Marston Rail Innovation Centre (MIS.3). In principle, we do not object to these sites being developed as Major Investment Sites. However, we do have some recommendations as to how any adverse effects on the CNL can be avoided and minimised, as outlined below.
The MIS at Long Marston Rail Innovation Centre comes within approximately 900m of the CNL boundary and within approximately 1.7km of elevated views from Public Rights of Way (PROW) on Meon Hill within the CNL. The MIS lies entirely within the 3km CNL buffer. The MIS at Long Marston Airfield comes within approximately 1.6km of the CNL boundary and within approximately 2km of elevated views from PROW on Meon Hill within the CNL. The vast majority of the site lies within the 3km CNL buffer.
Map showing the Major Investment Sites at Long Marston Airfield and Long Marston Rail Innovation Centre
Key:
•Yellow shading = Major Investment Sites
•Black hatching = Cotswolds National Landscape
•Grey shading = 3km buffer around the Cotswolds National Landscape
•Black lines = settlement boundary
•Area with no hatching or shading = other counties (including Gloucestershire and Worcestershire)
As such, these two MIS are clearly in the setting of the CNL. The panoramic views that are experienced from the Cotswold escarpment outliers, including Meon Hill, are one of the key features / characteristics of Landscape Character Type 1 (Escarpment Outliers).20 Great weight should be given to the impact of development at the two MIS on these views. Development at the two MIS should also be sensitively located and designed to avoid or minimise impacts on the CNL, in line with paragraph 189 of the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF).21
We recommend that explicit reference should be made to the above points in Draft Policy Direction 14 and in the supporting text.
In views from the CNL, the MIS at Long Marston Rail Innovation Centre lies beyond the existing built development at Meon Vale, which helps to limit potential visual impacts. The potential visual impacts would be further mitigated by the woodland in the Meon Vale Local Wildlife Site (LWS), which lies between the existing built development at Meon Vale and the Rail Innovation Centre. The triangle of land to the south west of the LWS and to the south east of the Rail Innovation Centre is identified, in the consultation interactive map, as a potential LWS. We recommend that the LWS should be expanded to include this land and that the trees here should be retained (not least, to help screen the Rail Innovation Centre in views from the CNL).
The existing development at Long Marston Airfield is clearly visible in views from the CNL, particularly from the Monarch’s Way and Centenary Way to the south east of Upper Quinton. Further development at the Long Marston Airfield MIS would increase the prominence of Long Marston Airfield in these views, albeit at some distance and in the context of existing development. Adverse impacts on these views could be mitigated, to some degree, by appropriate landscape mitigation measures (including tree planting and planting of hedgerows) along the southern and south-eastern boundaries of the site and within the site.
We recommend that the above recommendations should be explicitly addressed within Draft Policy Direction 14.
We acknowledge that Long Marston Airfield is already allocated as a new settlement in Stratford-on-Avon’s adopted Core Strategy.22 The site boundary for the MIS is the same as that used in the Core Strategy.23