Preferred Options 2025

1. Introduction

1.1 The South Warwickshire Local Plan (SWLP)

This emerging Local Plan is being prepared jointly by Stratford-on-Avon and Warwick District Councils and will become a statutory development plan document. Once adopted it will set out the strategic vision, objectives and spatial strategy for the South Warwickshire area as well as the planning policies which will determine the future location, scale, type and design of new development in the SWLP area up to 2050. This new local plan is about where and how new jobs, infrastructure and housing are all delivered in the context of place shaping and addressing climate change. The SWLP will also seek to ensure local development is built in accordance with the principles of sustainable development as set out in the National Planning Policy Framework (NPPF).

The NPPF (paragraph 49) sets out the weight to be attached to an emerging local plan, which is a matter of planning judgement for the decision-maker on each application. At this stage in the plan preparation process, the SWLP team advise the Preferred Options documentation should be given very limited weight.

1.2 South Warwickshire Today

Located to the south of the West Midlands conurbation, South Warwickshire covers 488 square miles of predominately open countryside and is made up of the Stratford-on-Avon and Warwick District Council Areas. With good motorway and rail connections between London and Birmingham, South Warwickshire is the gateway to the West Midlands. South Warwickshire has a varying landscape and includes parts of 5 national landscape character areas, of which the Cotswolds National Landscape is one, with 8% of the total area of South Warwickshire falling into this specific national landscape designation. Nearly a third of South Warwickshire is part of the West Midlands Green Belt, which is designed to prevent the unrestricted sprawl of urban areas.

Figure 1: South Warwickshire Facts and Figures

1.3 Purpose of the Consultation

Stratford-on-Avon District and Warwick District Councils are seeking the views of residents, businesses, developers, infrastructure providers, community groups and all other stakeholders on this 'preferred options' document.

We are still at the early stages of the process (stage 3 of 8), and further public consultation will follow. This consultation sets out the "Preferred Options" identified by both Councils following earlier consultations on the Scoping and Call for Sites and Issues and Options documents, as well as further evidenced work. Consultation will be undertaken in accordance with the requirements of the Local Plan Regulations and each Council's Statement of Community Involvement.

Once Part 1 is fully adopted, it will replace the existing strategic policies, and some of the detailed policies contained within the Stratford-on-Avon District Council Core Strategy and Warwick District Councils Local Plan.

Alongside this consultation there is also a focused 'Call for Sites'. This Call for Sites exercise is a targeted exercise and is only looking for sites that fall within the proposed new settlement locations or the adjoining areas, are proposed Gypsy and Traveller Sites, or are suitable for renewable energy generation. More on the call for sites can be found in section 2.3 Call for Sites.

1.4 What is SWLP Part 1?

Rather than have a single comprehensive plan it is envisaged that the plan will be broken down into separate parts as shown in Figure 2. Part 1 of the Plan will provide a policy framework for the delivery of sustainable development across the South Warwickshire area up to 2050. This Part 1 sets out the Spatial Strategy and strategic policies for the area to deliver sustainable development. The Plan will identify the number of new homes and jobs to be provided in the area and makes provision for the retail, leisure and other commercial and employment uses alongside the infrastructure needs to support the development.

There are however several exceptions to this. Some policy topics that would typically fall within Part 2 of the plan have been transferred to this Part 1. Given priorities within the two Councils it has been deemed necessary to advance the creation of these policies. A list of these expedited policies can be seen below:

• Arts and Culture
• Climate Resilient Design
• Design Codes
• Multi-functional Sustainable Drainage Systems
• Outdoor sports and leisure
• Trees, Hedges and Woodland
• Parks Gardens, food Growing Open Space and local green space
• Providing the Right Tenure and Type of Homes
• Providing the Right Size of Homes
• Protecting Community Facilities
• Water Efficiency
• Whole Life Cycle Carbon Emissions Assessments

As well as strategic policies (and the above expedited policies) Part 1 of the plan will also look to include strategic allocations, which are sites that are critical to the delivery of the plan. Existing policies which are not replaced in Part 1 of the plan could be saved and subsequently incorporated into Part 2 of the plan and/or other policy documents as appropriate. Part 2 of the plan will complement Part 1 plan and will contain the remaining detailed policies or policies that are much more specific to a local area. For example, a particular issue in Royal Leamington Spa, but not necessarily South Warwickshire, is the need to manage purpose-built student accommodation.

Further detail around the proposed contents of the Part 1 plan can be found in Chapter 12 of the Issues and Options Consultation document.

Figure 2: Different Parts of the SWLP

1.5 Allocations in other adopted and draft plans

The adopted Stratford-on-Avon Core Strategy (2016), Warwick District Local Plan (2017), and various made Neighbourhood Development Plans contain allocations for housing, employment land, and other land uses. These allocations remain in place while the SWLP is in preparation. If, at the point of SWLP adoption, any of these allocations have not been delivered, it may in certain cases be appropriate to roll these forward and allocate them in the SWLP; and in other cases, this may not be appropriate.

The SWLP will handle existing adopted allocations as follows:

Stratford-on-Avon District's Site Allocations Plan (SAP) revised preferred options document contains draft allocations for a number of land uses including self and custom housebuilding, reserve housing sites, and other specific site proposals.

The SWLP will handle draft allocations from the Site Allocations Plan as follows:

1.6 How is the SWLP being prepared?

In preparing the SWLP we need to base our proposals on expert technical evidence covering a range of planning topics. We will use the findings of the technical evidence to draft the policies and guidance contained in the SWLP. Our interpretation of this evidence is influenced by the feedback we receive from stakeholders, including the views of residents and businesses. Everything we do is also within the context set by national planning policy and guidance.

Ultimately, the SWLP must contribute to the achievement of sustainable development, and this means balancing the need for more jobs and homes against the impact on the built and natural environment. To help us understand and mitigate those impacts we prepare a Sustainability Appraisal that accompanies this consultation document.

Figure 3: Local Plan Refinement

1.7 What has been done so far?

1.7.1 Scoping and Call for Sites Consultation

Preparing the SWLP is not a single event and there are numerous stages of consultation (see Figure 4). The first consultation was the Scoping and Call for Sites which took place in 2021. There were two aspects to that consultation; firstly, to explore what the broad content of the SWLP should be and secondly to seek suggestions for sites for development through a call for sites request. Officers analysed the responses to the consultation and prepared a consultation statement that was made available on the SWLP website. The feedback was used to inform the contents of Issues and Options consultation document.

1.7.2 Issues and Options and Call for Sites Consultation

The Issues and Options Consultation along with Second Call for Sites was undertaken between 9^th January to 6^th March 2023. A total of 1175 respondents engaged with the consultation document providing comments to one or more questions contained within the document. A summary of the consultation responses is available within the Issues and Options Consultation statement. Officers have analysed the responses and used these to inform this Preferred Options document.

1.7.3 Call for Sites 1 & 2

As a result of the two calls for site exercises, 736 sites have been submitted to the councils for inclusion within the plan. All sites submitted through the call for sites process are available to view on the SWLP Website, on the interactive map. These sites have now all been assessed through the Housing and Economic Land Availability Assessment (HELAA) site assessment process. HELAA part A sifted out those sites subject to significant constraints to development, for which mitigation would not be possible or would be very difficult to achieve. Sites which were not sifted out in Part A progressed through to HELAA Part B. This part assessed a wide range of constraints, taking a more holistic view of the relative merits of the site as a whole. All sites assessed in HELAA Part B are still in consideration for inclusion in the plan. More information on the HELAA process can be found in the methodology and summary of results topic paper.

1.7.4 Stakeholder engagement

As part of the preparation for the Preferred Options Consultation document we have engaged with various stakeholders, including Parish Councils and key infrastructure organisations, and have conducted interactive stakeholder sessions. These sessions focused on 'Place Analysis' for a number of settlements. This analysis looked at key features within a settlement, areas that are considered problematic by local stakeholders, and ways that these problems could be resolved. Officers have taken feedback from these sessions on board as they have progressed with this Preferred Options Consultation, particularly with regards to selecting potential strategic areas of growth.

1.7.5 Technical Evidence

Officers on the SWLP team have also commissioned various consultants to conduct numerous technical assessments. The Technical Evidence that has been obtained following the Issues and Options Consultation is available online and is as follows:

• Assessment of Carbon Sequestration and Habitat baseline and opportunities
• Coventry & Warwickshire HEDNA – WMSESS Alignment Paper
• Equalities Impact Assessment (EQIA) - Preferred Options
• Gypsy, Traveller, Travelling Showpeople and Boat Dwellers Accommodation Assessment
• Habitats Regulations Assessment (HRA) – Preferred Options
• HELAA assessment methodology and results
• Health Impact Assessment (HIA) – Preferred Options
• High Level Transport Assessment
• Infrastructure Delivery Plan (Part One)
• Long Marston Airfield Garden Village: Sustainable Transport Viability & Feasibility Assessment
• Developing the Detail of the Sustainable Transport Vision for Long Marston Airfield Garden Village - The Vision - Part 2 Evidencing the Vision
• New Settlements Note – Employment
• New Settlement Assessment (as at Preferred Options)
• Renewables and Decentralised Energy Opportunities
• Retail and Town Centre Uses Study
• South Warwickshire Green Belt Review Stage 1
• South Warwickshire Employment Land Study
• Spatial Growth Strategy topic paper
• Vision and Validate - Site based Sustainable Transport Vision - Long Marston Airfield Garden Village - The Vision
• Water Cycle Study
• Warwickshire, Coventry & Solihull sub-regional green Infrastructure strategy
• West Midlands Strategic Employment Sites Study
• WCC – SWLP Strategic Transport and Education Assessment of New Settlement Options – Oct 2024

Figure 4: Timetable for the SWLP

1.8 Structure of the Preferred Options Consultation

This "Preferred Options" Document follows on from the previous two consultations. It addresses a number of topics, and then presents the preferred approach to addressing them. In this consultation document there are a range of draft policies, and draft policy directions. Table 1 lists all of the policies within the document, and outlines whether it is a draft policy direction, or draft policy.

Draft policies contain details of the subject matter and clearly set out the requirements of what the policy would like to achieve. The draft policy directions are just an indication of the direction of travel the final policy will take and gives an indication about the content and aspiration of the policy to be drafted at Regulation 19 stage. The level of detail is not as advanced in these policy directions, as will be visible in the draft policies. Throughout the document the draft policies are highlighted in the following colours:

The consultation document is split into 11 chapters and the glossary which is Chapter 12. Chapters 1-3 provide context to the document, providing a summary, details on what the Local Plan is, the consultation process, and outlines the vision and strategic objectives. Chapter 4 onwards contains the policy topics. At the beginning of chapters 4 onwards there is a short section outlining the issues covered in that chapter. Chapter 12 contains the glossary.

Each policy topic is structured in a uniform way:

• Initially the section starts with a paragraph setting the scene about the topic.
• It is followed by what was said at Issues and Options Consultation. This section is intended to show how responses to the previous consultations have been considered.
• Next, each policy topic will have a box outlining either the draft policy, or draft policy direction. This box will either be  for the draft policies, or  for the draft policy directions.
• Finally, the policy topic will be accompanied by a justification as to why the draft policy/policy direction has been progressed.

Each policy topic therefore shows the preferred approach, and how this approach has been reached. The consultation seeks views on whether residents and stakeholders agree with the proposed approach.

Table 1: List of draft policies and policy directions

Key:

1.9 Sustainability Appraisal/ Strategic Environmental Assessment (SA/SEA) and Habitats Regulation Assessment (HRA)

Sustainability Appraisals (SA) are carried out in line with Government guidance to meet the terms of Strategic Environmental Assessment (SEA) which are required under the Environmental Assessment of Plans and Programmes Regulations 2004 (known as the SEA Regulations). A Sustainability Appraisal was carried out to evaluate the social, environmental, and economic effects of reasonable alternatives considered for the South Warwickshire Local Plan at the Regulation 18 Issues & Options stage. Further work has been undertaken on the Sustainability Appraisal to support this Preferred Options consultation to evaluate further reasonable alternatives and proposals relating to the proposed growth strategy, policies and policy directions. The production of a Sustainability Appraisal is an iterative process and further versions of the South Warwickshire Local Plan, including the draft Local Plan, will be assessed as policies and proposals become defined to ensure that the Local Plan is produced in accordance with the Government's definition of sustainable development included in the NPPF (2024).

The Conservation of Habitats and Species Regulations 2017 as amended (known as the Habitats Regulations) requires the relevant competent authority to carry out a Habitats Regulations Assessment (HRA) to test if a plan or project proposal could significantly harm the designated features of a European site. Both Stratford-on-Avon District Council and Warwick District Council will be required to ensure that such an assessment has been carried out whilst preparing the South Warwickshire Local Plan.

1.10 Duty to Co-operate

The Duty to Co-operate was created in the Localism Act 2011. It places a legal duty on local planning authorities to engage constructively and on ongoing basis with relevant bodies and organisations to address the strategic and cross boundary issues. The SWLP considers the implications of planning policies of the neighbouring authorities. Both Councils have actively engaged with neighbouring authorities through the representation at various Coventry, Solihull and Warwickshire Association of Planning Officers (CSWAPO) meetings and having continuous engagement with neighbouring authorities on strategic issues and matters.

1.11 Next Stages

Once the consultation has ended officers will collate and analyse the responses and prepare a consultation statement that will be made available on our SWLP website. These responses, alongside further Technical Evidence, will be used to inform the next iteration of the plan. The next stage will be a statutory consultation on Publication Stage (Regulation 19). This Regulation 19 consultation will be a further enhancement to this Preferred Options consultation, and where policy directions have been consulted on, these will be presented as full policies. The next iteration of the plan will be the plan as proposed prior to it being sent to the Secretary of State (stage 5). After the Regulation 19 consultation, only minor changes are likely to be made.