Breaking News
The Wealden District Council and South Downs National Park Authority submitted its Core Strategy to the Secretary of State for Independent Examination in August last year. The Hearing sessions have now closed but the Examination of the Core Strategy remains open until receipt of the Inspectors Report. The Inspector’s Report will be sent to the Council for fact checking by the 19th October 2012. It is likely to be in the Public Domain in early November.
Controversial Issues
... include the Ashdown Forest, seven kilometre development exclusion zone and the refusal of a scheme to build 160 new homes at the back of Heathfield Police Station because they would intrude onto the ANOB.
Bexhill Link Road – Shock Decision
The Planning agenda for both Rother and Hastings has been shaken to the core by the Secretary of State for Transport finally after ten years’ of valiant campaigning against by the local CPRE and other bodies including the Hastings Alliance, deciding to give the go ahead to the severing of the Coombe Haven SSSI and much more unique countryside by the Bexhill Hastings Link Road. Not only will the road be a massive waste of national and local taxpayers’ money as it will at least at one end (Baldslow Down) be not reaching its intended destination – the A21, its justification has been so far as ESCC is concerned is that it will open up areas for housing and commercial development. Yet the proof of the wrongness of the decision is that no developer who has been contacted has indicated any willingness at all to contribute their own money to the cost of the road. Arguably the only one small blessing – if the road does actually get built - is that it will relieve some of the pressure on rural villages in Rother who would otherwise have to accept large numbers of houses up to the end of the plan period in 2026.
NPPF
The effect of NPPF should be to spur both Hastings and Rother to finalise their development frameworks because the tighter their frameworks, the less the vague NPPF can be used by developers to dump inappropriate development on our countryside.
Wealden District Core Strategy
The recent examination in public of the Wealden District core strategy has had a profound effect on planning in our district. The planning inspector proposed modifications to Wealden’s strategy to reflect the requirements of the EU Habitats Directive. This in turn prompted Natural England to revise its advice to all planning authorities, and Mid Sussex DC to suspend all planning decisions in the vicinity of the protected Ashdown Forest. We welcome this turn of events, as it has focused councils’ minds on the need to balance development with protection of endangered animal species and habitats. It remains to be seen if the result will be a more sensible balance in favour of the environment. We will be watching closely.
Newhaven incinerator
The incinerator is now operational.
Peacehaven wastewater treatment plant
This giant facility has now disappeared underground, and will soon be processing Brighton's sewage.
Lewes District Core Strategy
Planners have been considering the consultation responses to the draft version of the Core Strategy, plus the implications of the NPPF, for almost a year. The submission version, containing urban and rural housing targets, is now believed to be imminent (expected to be published mid-October).
Proposed Clay Hll reservoir
CPRE argued strongly and effectively against the inclusion of the proposed Clay Hill water storage reservoir, near Ringmer, at the Inquiry into the 2009 South East Water WRMP (Water Resources Management Plan), on environmental and landscape grounds. Our reservations were largely accepted in the Inspector's report. The team preparing the revised WRMP for 2014 has now decided to omit Clay Hill from its feasible options, though a number of alternative reservoir options are still under consideration.
Waste disposal by land raising
CPRE's opposition to changing the Wealden landscape by tipping thousands of tons of domestic and commercial waste onto unspoilt coutryside has also been successful. The final version of the East Sussex, Brighton & Hove Waste & Minerals Plan, currently subject to Examination, dismisses the landraise options in favour of increased recycling and recovery of the materials present.
Local issues:
CPRE successfully opposed planning applications to develop a large elderly care facility on a greenfield countryside site near South Chailey (refused by the Planning Applications Committee, against officers' recommendations) and a premature application, in advance of the Core Strategy and the Newick neighbourhood Plan, for residential development on a SHLAA site at Newick Hill (withdrawn in the face of opposition). Having a stand at the Lewes District Summer Fair was a successful, generating a great deal of interest and discussion.
Horsham District Planning Framework
Consultation on Horsham District Council’s Horsham District Planning Framework – ‘Preferred Strategy’ is imminent. ‘Possible’ strategic sites’ identified by HDC, all of which are greenfield, are as follows:
- East of Billingshurst: 1750 new houses.
- New Market Town: “Approximately 10,000 (total) ...2,500 of these delivered in Horsham District in the short to medium term”.
- North of Horsham; 4,500 new houses, plus up to 300,000 square feet of business and office space.
- West of Ifield: up to 2500 new houses.
- West of Southwater: 2,500 new houses.
House numbers, which are likely to be greater than the South East Plan allocation, and the identified strategic sites have yet to be ratified by the Council. We will be taking part in the consultation.
Planning
With others, we are opposing outline applications for major developments on countryside at:
- Billingshurst: Application to build 550 houses (phase one of a 1750 house development) was refused by HDC but has reappeared as a ‘possible’ Local Plan option.
- Southwater: Application to build 500 houses on farmland, phase one of a 2750 house development, has been put on hold. The site is identified by HDC as a ‘possible’ strategic site – ‘West of Southwater’.
In addition we have objected to applications, which have now been approved, as follows:
- Henfield: The second of two opportunistic applications to build 102 houses on countryside east of Manor Farm, Henfield, was refused. However, the first which went to Appeal on grounds of non-determination was subsequently approved by the Planning Inspectorate.
- Thakeham: ‘Mushroom Site’ Two linked planning applications, one to build 146 houses on a redundant part of the site to help pay for the provision of new commercial facilities applied for on the remainder of the site, have been approved by HDC.
Almodington Glasshouses Appeal
The appeal was, to our relief, dismissed. However the area south of Chichester is a favoured location for horticulture for climatic reasons. This contributes to the local economy and is to be welcomed in the right place. For the same reason we have had two applications to build solar arrays, one at Tangmere and one at Selsey, which we are challenging as an intrusion into the countryside.
Chichester Local Plan
Our Local Plan is dated 1999 and the new one will not appear until late 2014. This invites opportunistic applications. At the time of writing there are piecemeal proposals for building 1085 houses on 13 sites in clusters of between 25 and 500 units. Among the threats to the countryside around Chichester are proposals which include developments to fill the “strategic gap” between Summersdale and Lavant and the green fields between the City boundary and the Goodwood motor circuit. One might also predict pressure to extend the Horticultural Development Area.
Active support needed!
We need the active support of all local members throughout Chichester District. Autumn Open Meeting An open meeting is planned (and may have taken place by the time you read this) for members in both halves of the District, partly to introduce our new Director, and partly to help monitor the Local Plan which will affect us all.
If you care about preserving the unique character of our District, make yourself known by ringing or emailing me on telephone 01243 779359
Lavant Strategic Gap
Application to build 92 houses on greenfield site is threatening the Strategic Gap between South Downs villages of Lavant & Chichester.
St Cuthman's School / Durand Academy
Plans to increase use of the old school site in Woolbeding from a hundred to approximately a six hundred and fifty pupil school. Fears that a commendable idea has been inadequately thought through by all concerned including the Government, and that the choice of an inappropriate site has been made when other more suitable sites are available for evaluation.
Boxgrove Quarry
Council Meetings attended in support of objections to delivery & processing of 980,000 tons of waste over 5 years, with impact upon a rural village, narrow lanes used by walkers, and views from SDNP. Syngenta. Ongoing.
Sparkes Farm (Ebernoe Common)
Concern re impact of proposed equestrian centre visually and upon public walkways in an unspoiled rural area on land to south of Lake House. On hold. Weavers Down (Milland Parish). New golf course proposed, with associated destructive ecological impact.
Brighton & Hove City Plan
The City’s vision for development and growth up to 2030 it includes long expected development plans for Toads Hole Valley, one of the last large areas of green space on the north west city edge, bounded by housing and the A27.
We have challenged the proposed density.
Rampion Wind Farm
Response to the Environmental Impact Assessment submitted asking for greater attention to the effect on both land and seascapes.
Arun District Draft Local Plan
As previously predicted, Arun DC unveiled in July for public consultation its draft new Local Plan, setting out NPPF-compliant planning policies for Arun District over the next sixteen years.
Although the draft claims to protect “our much valued landscape including the coastal plains...and the land between existing settlements” (para. 1.3), it concedes that Arun is legally bound to plan for the housing targets in the still-unrevoked South East Plan and therefore takes into account both ADC's “preferred” target of an average 400 new units a year and the SEP average of 565 a year.
In order to satisfy the higher SEP target, the draft therefore identifies the three villages of Barnham, Eastergate and Westergate “with their local services and the vastness of undesignated space between them” (para. 4.9) as an area that is a “particularly sustainable location” for additional housing growth - and consequently a “strategic allocation” of 1700 or more new homes (Policy SP8).
Subject to improvements to the A259, Angmering is also named as a “strategic growth location” for up to 1030 new homes, while other parishes in the District are expected to accommodate at least 1120 new units - though rather surpisingly almost none are allocated to the parishes covered by the abortive Ford eco-town (Policy SP8). Since further consultation on the draft Plan is promised over the winter, it remains to be seen whether these allocations are final.
