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Re: Proposed development at Old Milverton, Blackdown and the rest of the areas at north Leamington.
I am writing to oppose the District Council's plans to develop on Green Belt Land as shown in their 2012 Preferred Options booklet. Nothing has changed since the 2009 Core Strategy, so there cannot be any justification for these fundamental changes now.
The Green Belt
The proposals ignore Warwick District Council's study of the Green Belt land at Old Milverton and Blackdown, which concluded that these areas had high Green Belt value
The National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF) sets out five purposes for Greenbelt land. In summary these are, to prevent urban sprawl of built up areas, to prevent neighbouring towns merging, to protect the country side from encroachment, to preserve the setting and special character of historic towns and to assist urban regeneration by encouraging the recycling of urban land. The Greenbelt land identified for development in the Preferred Option does carry out these purposes and its development would therefore be contrary to the NPPF. The proposals will reduce the" Green Lung" between Leamington and Kenilworth to less than 1 1/2 miles encouraging the merger of these two towns and their loss of independent identities.
There will be a loss of a significant amount of high quality agricultural land in Blackdown and Old Milverton.
Number of Homes included in the Forecasts
Warwick District Council has added nearly 1400 homes to the number that it anticipates will be required so as to include a "buffer" in the forecasts. If this "buffer" is removed from the forecast there is no need to include the land at Old Milverton and Blackdown in the proposals.