Testun llawn:
Further to my objection, already sent by email, to the preferred options in the Council's new local plan. I hope you won't mind if I send some further observations after the packed meeting at Old Milverton Church last evening.
In the long presentation residents listened to from the planning officer, although he talked regularly of having to base decisions on "evidence", there was no evidence-based justification offered for why the parcels of land in South Leamington which had been identified for development in 2010, had been removed from this new set of preferred options. What we got was a lot of supposition, "we think," and "it might reach a tipping point." And "if the government didn't accept;" (though why they shouldn't accept building on non green belt land in preference to green belt land was never made clear.) None of these arguments, in the minds of the numerous residents there, added up to "exceptional circumstances" to justify building on green belt land before non green belt land.
The mention of the three gas pipes as a barrier to development in the South seemed a minor obstacle that could easily be got around. Professional planners and architects in the audience attested they could be used as cycle paths or green pathways in the sort of mixed development the council says it favours. They certainly didn't add up to a justification to completely remove a major prime development site which isn't designated as green belt, from the list of options.
The excuse that there would be too many sites being worked on at once really doesn't hold water when the council has explained that the development will be going on over a period of 15 to 20 years. The infra-structure costs are more cost efficient in the South of the town and should be concentrated there to make a real difference to the lives of residents who live close to where their employment is most likely to be.
To spend tax-payers money on an extremely expensive relief road over valuable green belt land in the North just doesn't make any sense at all. There should be no need for it.
It became quite clear that the number of houses being planned was by the Council's own admission, far higher than their own (questionably arrived at ) projections demonstrate a need for. Again we weren't given any evidence based calculation for the final number of houses arrived at but the rather vague argument "if in the future we decided we needed some more." Is this an exceptional circumstance which justifies building on highly rated green belt land?
Councillor Doody suggested we write to make suggestions of where else the development should go. Well of course the first answer is on the non green belt land the council has itself identified. The next answer is that the place you absolutely don't start your development is on the green belt land that your own Joint Study has identified as meeting all the purposes of green belt land, of being of high value, and has recommended, "should be wholly retained within the green belt." I am referring here to the parcel of land WL7 at Blackdown/Westhill.
If you absolutely have to encroach on green belt land, which I don't believe you have demonstrated that you do, you should start on parcels of land with a lower value and you have already identified these in the Joint Study.
In terms of being a prime example of Arden character parkland, the Joint study was so impressed by the land at Blackdown that they included a photograph of it as an exemplar of the type. This land is enjoyed not just by the local residents who overlook it but thanks to a public footpath, by the very many residents of Leamington, Lillington, Blackdown and Cubbington who regularly walk over it. Furthermore the Joint Study stressed that there was already a very well defined boundary along Leicester land. To develop this land would be to subsume the hamlet of Blackdown in the sprawl of Cubbington, Lillington and Leamington which is totally contrary to Nation Planning Policy guidelines.
I would like to finish by agreeing with the speaker last night who complained that the "Preferred Options" could not be seen by any of us as "options" when there were no alternatives offered. The consultation that went on before the 2010 plan was released was a far fairer and more extensive exercise than this one has been, and it arrived at conclusions that were based on a majority view of residents based over a wide area not just in the areas affected. On this occasion residents feel they have been bounced into a totally unfair and rather speedy process and that they are faced with trying to get the Council to back down when they have already made their minds up.
My one glimmer of hope is that there were local councillors present last night who listened to the residents objections. I was hugely disappointed that as a Councillor of many years standing and as one of my representative on the council, Councillor Doody appeared to have very much made his mind up before he came. His comments as he left the meeting were disgracefully partisan and not at all in the spirit of consultation, but I trust that the others truly understand the nature of consultation and hope that they will feel able to support us in opposing the preferred options that have been put forward.