Testun llawn:
Having lived in and enjoyed living in Hampton Magna for almost 20 years I am of course concerned about what goes on locally, and this seems to be the biggest single thing so far. We have had proposals to turn the former Warwickshire Regiment parade ground into a mini-industrial site (now a livery stable, much more in keeping with the surroundings), a telephone signal mast on the verge of a blind bend (thankfully not materialised) and of course the reality of Warwick Parkway Station. This is a very useful facility, although I am dismayed at the way the car park is gradually creeping across the land on the other side of the road, and of course the surrounding promised landscaping never happened (weeds galore instead of properly planted and maintained grounds by the station building). The other issue is that complaints regarding commuter parking in Hampton Magna are not taken seriously. Further afield there is Chase Meadow and Hatton Park - the land is considerably less green than when we first moved here and thought how nice it was to be living in the countryside. The green belt has been eaten into enough around here in the last 20 years - what's the use of it if you keep allowing it to be built on?
Moving on to the proposed housing. Whilst not really wanting any change personally, I agree with the broad principle that new housing, both large and affordable homes, are needed locally and that all communities should be prepared to accept some new housing. The problem I have with the current plan is the percentage scale compared with the size of the existing community of Hampton Magna. Up to 150 new houses added to the current 600 is actually a 25% increase in the size of the village as a whole. This seems to me an unreasonable increase - for a village whose residents are used to open fields and countryside around them an increase of 25% is breathtaking. An increase of any size is unwelcome, but in line with my view above an increase of 5% - 10% would show that we are not "nimbys" and are prepared to shoulder our fair share of the burden. There lies the word - FAIR - 25% is NOT.
The other worry I have is local access and services. Wherever you see new housing the local services are slow to follow - bus services, extra school places, community facilities all take a ridiculous second place. How long have the first houses been up at Chase Meadow? They are just getting their community centre now. It isn't good enough. Hampton Magna needs a new community centre to replace the current tired and cramped building - how about these developers should replace this first as a gesture to the community in return for destroying so much green belt land for their profits? The school is full to bursting with current and future known students, never mind the extra ones from the proposed new houses - again the developers should help to pay for new school buildings to cope, and at the same time ease the burden on us taxpayers.
Hampton Magna suffers from restricted access due to the 2 sets of traffic lights and the road narrowing out onto the Birmingham Road - it can take 15 minutes to leave the village at peak travel times, and this by all logic will only get worse with 10% more housing, never mind 25%. At the latter percentage and two cars per house that's an extra 50% increase in traffic every day. We already have a considerable amount of "rat run" traffic, the roads have blind bends, narrowings etc. and really do not need more cars. Going out the other way through Hampton on the Hill is no better - blind bends, more narrowings, a blind summit and a fairly dreadful junction out on to the Henley Road.
Gypsy sites - oh such an emotive subject, and quite rightly so. Again logic says if they are so keen to be called travellers why do they need permanent sites? Who pays for them to be built, maintained and administered? I think I can probably make a shrewd guess of the answer on this one. What do travellers get on these permanent sites? Do they pay rent whilst they are there in residence? Are there penalties imposed for misuse? You should provide a lot more information to us permanent, sitting-duck, tax- and council-tax, national insurance, private pension-paying residents so that we can see why you are so keen to accommodate these people on our doorsteps. Just saying central government has told us to doesn't impress I'm afraid. I am not in favour at all, especially as the Hampton Magna/Budbrooke/Hatton area has the majority of the proposed sites, but maybe I would be a bit more flexible if I could be assured that I would not be driving past a dirty smelly tip passing for a residential complex on a daily basis. My experience of travelling people is not happy - a fight amongst 6 year olds at my childrens' primary school within 2 weeks of travelling children being temporarily enrolled, having to park at work after travellers illegally used it as a place to live and left behind all manner of disgusting and unnecessary mess, and the burglary of a neighbour's house where I used to live directly linked to travellers in the area.
All in all, I am not in favour of your local plan as it stands - please at least decrease the number of houses Hampton Magna is expected to take and insist that developers make a significant contribution to local infrastructure before they build. Please distribute the gypsy sites fairly throughout the area - we should really only have to put up with one small one like everyone else if we have to have any at all.