Dear Sirs,

Thank you for consulting the Canal & River Trust on the Submission version of the Budbrooke Neighbourhood Development Plan.

The Canal & River Trust is a company limited by guarantee and registered as a charity. It is separate from government but still the recipient of a significant amount of government funding.

The Trust has a range of charitable objects including:

* To hold in trust or own and to operate and manage inland waterways for public benefit, use and enjoyment;
* To protect and conserve objects and buildings of heritage interest;
* To further the conservation, protection and improvement of the natural environment of inland waterways; and
* To promote sustainable development in the vicinity of any inland waterways for the benefit of the public.

The Trust owns and operates the Grand Union Canal, about 2.3km of which falls within the Budbrooke Neighbourhood Plan area, including 11 locks of the Hatton Lock Flight (locks 26-36).

The Trust wishes to comment on two of the draft policies included within the Plan, where we consider that amendments would assist in ensuring that the Plan could better meet the Basic Conditions that it is required to satisfy.

Policy BNDP4
The policy proposes to give priority to a number of proposals. One of which is the installation of a foot and cycle bridge across the A46 to facilitate easier access into Warwick. Consideration does not appear to have been given to the potential for improving the Grand Union Canal towpath to better facilitate access into Warwick. The canal is located some 600m north-west of Hampton Magna and the towpath already provides a sustainable traffic-free route towards the town centre which passes under the A46 just north of Warwick Parkway.

In order to ensure that the Plan contributes to the achievement of sustainable development, it should consider the feasibility of utilising the canal towpath as a means of providing enhanced cycle and pedestrian access to Warwick which avoids the need to construct a new (and potentially very expensive) bridge to cross the A46.

We therefore suggest that this alternative option should also be explored as a potentially more realistic, cost-effective and sustainable option that would contribute to the achievement of sustainable development and achieve general conformity with Policies HS4 and HS6 of the adopted Warwick District Local Plan 2011-2029 and. In particular, the canal towpath offers an opportunity to realise the aims of Policy HS6 (e) and (f) as its enhancement can assist in it functioning as a recreational resource as well as providing a commuting route to gain access across the A46 towards Warwick.

We suggest that this matter could be addressed by including the option of investigating the feasibility of improving the canal towpath to encourage its greater use as a cycle/pedestrian link into Warwick within the wording of Policy BNDP4 as one of the priority proposals.

Policy BNDP10
The policy aims to secure provision of sustainable transport measures through new development proposals. To reflect our comments above regarding Policy BNDP4 and to ensure consistency with our suggested amendments to that Policy, we consider that Criterion (b) of Policy BNDP10 should include explicit consideration of the role that the Grand Union Canal towpath could play in providing safe, traffic-free access into Warwick for pedestrians and cyclists, without the need to construct a potentially expensive new bridge over the A46.

Criterion (c) should also acknowledge the role that the canal towpath could play as part of the existing network of publicly accessible paths within the Plan area, and the benefits that enhancements to it could achieve in terms of providing a valuable link to the wider area, particularly Warwick, but also to the west, heading up the Hatton Lock Flight.


Please do not hesitate to contact me direct should you require anything further.

Regards,


Ian Dickinson MRTPI
Area Planner (East and West Midlands)