Tomorrow: EIP hearing for THORBURY - MATTER 27

At last we come to the day that may well define Thornbury for years to come. We have pinned a lot of faith and hope on an Independent Inspector who sees the Core Strategy and  its Sustainability Appraisal relating to Thornbury, for what it is – deeply flawed and unsound.

A number of STGH members will be attending the hearing, together with NorthWest Thornbury Independnet Councillors Rob Hudson, Vincent Costello and Gareth Davies, and a few local residents, all of whom have been invited to join the table of discussions. We’ve spent a few hours this evening ordering our files and reviewing the questions posed by the Inspector.

I’m not certain that by tea-time tomorrow there will necessarily be clear indications as to the Inspector’s conclusions. It may certainly stir things up for next week’s Special Town Council Meeting on Tuesday 17th July at 7pm in the Town Hall, when Councillors will be discussing Barratt’s latest housing application for Park Farm.(All members of the public welcomed to attend, and also to speak.) I shall report back before then as to any inklings from the hearing tomorrow.

Our sincere hope is that Area Fa or Option 6 (Park Farm) is deleted from the Core Strategy as an unsustainable option for housing development. When the majority (Lib Dem) Town Councillors have argued so long and so strenuously for more housing for Thornbury, the implications that this may have for developing other parts of Thornbury is hard to anticipate. A major strand of the EIP hearing relating to all South Glos, is that the Inspector is looking for more, not fewer houses across the county. 

Despite  STGH consistently arguing that Thornbury should retain its current footprint and meet housing needs from within brownfield sites, Thornbury may well be presented with some difficult options tomorrow, that will have ramifications across the whole town.

Update from EIP Programme Officer Kath Thorne:

Dear Participant

The Inspector has now reviewed issues that arose during the first two weeks of the hearing sessions and has decided that it would be helpful to clarify certain matters arising from the discussions to date.  It is, therefore, the Inspector’s intention to hold further sessions on Wednesday, 18 July and in this respect, please find attached a note from him indicating the format for these extra sessions;  you will see that there are 4 areas which the Inspector wishes to cover. (See Note below.)

Please can you confirm your attendance by sending me an email or giving me a call.  It is expected that those who participated in sessions 8 & 13 re housing and retail will wish to attend on the 18 July.

You will see from the note that the Inspector has indicated that if you are unable to attend these extra sessions, he is willing to take written submissions, although he asks that these are as brief as possible, do not repeat arguments previously made and explain how far any changes would address your concerns or what further alterations would be needed in order to do so.

For information, please note for those who are not already aware, the Inspector has rescheduled Matter 28 Communities of the East Fringe to Tuesday 17 July 2012 commencing at 2pm in order to extend Matter 27 – Thornbury on the 13 July to a full day in view of the number of participants.

An updated programme will be placed on the examination website later this morning and a copy of the attached note put into the examination library (PA19).

If you have any queries regarding any of the above, please do not hesitate to contact me.

Kind regards

Kath

Kath Thorne

Programme Officer

South Gloucestershire LDF - Core Strategy Examination

DD: 01454 863742

Note from Inspector: 

SOUTH GLOUCESTERSHIRE CORE STRATEGY – FURTHER SESSIONS ‐ WEEK 4
 
Having reviewed issues in the first two weeks of the hearing sessions I have decided it would be helpful to clarify certain matters arising from the discussions to date.
My intention is to hold further sessions on Wednesday 18 July. Thursday 19 July will be available to complete these if it is not possible to do so on the 18th.

The areas I wish to cover are:
1.  Revisions to policy CS15 and the provision of a 5 year housing land supply.
2.  Consideration of alternative policy wording in relation to the Mall and Cribbs Causeway retail areas. Following the debate on Matter 13 the Council said it would clarify how these locations should be treated during the plan period.
3.  Options for taking the CS forward, assuming it is possible to address deficiencies in the Plan, whether by means of a further period of suspension, early review of the Plan or any other mechanism.
4.  Initial views of key policy changes put forward in the Council’s ‘Schedule of Rolling Suggested Changes’ (SRC1) in advance of main modifications I might recommend.
 
I do not wish to hear points which have already been made but would like to know if any of the changes would address in whole or part the problems identified by participants. This would help me to decide whether it would be possible to recommend modifications to make the Plan sound.
My intention is to devote the morning of the 18th to housing and retail changes (items 1 & 2) and the first part of the afternoon to item 3. Under item 4 I do not consider it is necessary to seek views on every modification suggested by the Council but I would welcome them on those I consider to be of particular importance.
It is possible that other matters will arise during Week 3 which necessitate inclusion as part of the additional sessions in Week 4. Should this happen I will deal with these issues on 19th July.
For any participant who is unable to be present at these extra sessions I am willing to take written submissions although I ask that these be as brief as possible, do not repeat arguments previously made and explain how far any changes would address your concerns or what further alterations would be needed in order to do so.
Paul Crysell
Inspector
30 June 2012

COMMUNITY PLAN and EIP LATEST

1. Thornbury Town Community Plan

The official launch of the Community Plan will be on this coming Thursday 10th May, starting at 7.30pm in the Cossham Hall. Although this will not necessarily OVERTLY deal with planning issues, it will be an opportunity for members of the public to identify the issues they feel are most pressing for our town. All residents are welcome to offer their views, and most importantly, this will be giving local people the opportunity to volunteer to help shape the future of our town - an opportunity that should not lightly be passed up.

2. The Examination in Public  (EIP) for Thornbury – Friday 13^th July ‘12

The Planning Inspector has now confirmed the Matters he wishes to cover at the Hearings for Thornbury on 13^th July. These provide the basis for further discussion during the Hearing and are detailed below:-

 THORNBURY – POLICIES CS32 & CS33

1.            Concerns have been raised regarding both the consultation process and the sustainability appraisal.  What evidence is there to show the Council has failed to comply with the either legislative or regulatory requirements in connection with these processes?

2.            A number of respondents say the Council’s aim to retain and improve services, facilities and employment in Thornbury is not supported by the evidence.  What information has the Council relied upon in reaching its conclusions on the need for and the scale of development appropriate for the town?

3.            In relation to proposals for development at Park Farm a number of potential constraints have been identified.  These include heritage and archaeological assets, wildlife and agricultural land quality as well as concerns with flooding, the loss of open space and access issues.  How far have these factors been taken into account in identifying this location as the Council’s preferred choice?

4.            Do alternative sites in the Thornbury area particularly to the east and south have advantages over the Park Farm location and, if so, what are these?

5.            Is Morton Way South a more sustainable location for housing purposes and/or are the constraints at this location a significant factor against the development?

6.            Some respondents are concerned that no account has been taken of the impact of a new nuclear power station at Oldbury.  How significant is this to the proposals for Thornbury?

The latest list of participants asked by the Inspector to be part of the hearing includes:-

Oldbury Parish Council

J Richards Bloor Homes

Thornbury Town Council

Thornbury NW Ward Independent Town Councillors (Gareth Davies/Vincent Costello)

Shortwood GB Campaign

Pegasus Pl for Barratts

Graham Lanfear

R.Hudson

Emery Planning for Fearson Homes

Grace Davies - STGH

Rosemary Burton

T Roberts for Atherton Family Trust

Chris Rickard

Mrs Hall

Dominic Lawson

The Examination Hearings for South Gloucestershire actually commence at 10.00am on 19 June and will take place in the Council offices at Kingswood Civic Centre, High Street, Kingswood BS15 9TR.  The Inspector has lots of issues regarding the Core Strategy that need resolving – full details of all these issues and matters for each hearing session are on the South Glos website: www.southglos.gov.uk/corestrategyexamination

The Thornbury hearing on 13^th July is towards the end of the hearing period. 

STGH will be continuing to put forward the evidence that the Core Strategy for Thornbury is unsound and does not follow the principles of the government’s NPPF (National Planning Policy Framework). We continue to believe that Thornbury’s green heritage should be protected.    

Members of the public are allowed to attend any of the sessions to observe, but only those invited to participate can do so. 

If you have questions or concerns you wish to discuss with STGH, please contact us by email ourgreenheritage@gmail.com

The EXAMINATION IN PUBLIC (EIP)

Finally we arrive at the EIP season proper.

The LOCALISM ACT is now in place.

SGC have completed their Core Strategy work and submissions to the Indpendent Inspector Paul Crysell are done.
If you wish to read all responses to the Inspector, bySGC, by public bodies, by members of the public, by developers, by councillors, by other interested parties, you can ...

check out this SGC WEBSITE.

Be warned that in our experience, it is frequently not connecting adequately.
We are also attaching a couple of draft publications relating to the EIP.

EIP Draft Programme and participants list

Draft (11April) Programme for SG CS - covering letter

If you wish to personally attend any hearings, even more if you wish to speak, it is important that your name appears on the documentation being collated by Kath Thorne the programme officer.
Save Thornbury's Green Heritage will be contributing to the examination - we will update you as to who will specifically speak at what hearing. If you still have burning issues that you fear may not be represented at that examination, we would welcome you to contact us and discuss those issues with us further.

COMMUNITY PLANNING AND THE NEW LOCALISM ACT

We haven’t posted for a few weeks now – taking a breather after the flurry of activites surrounding the final deadline for submissions to the Independent Inspector. Too late to submit any written representations. Now we wait to find out the initial response of the Inspector to SGC revisions, and presumably await the publication of a timetable for public hearings. We will keep you posted as the news breaks.

Meanwhile, please be informed that the date for the lauch of the Thornbury Community Plan has been postponed. It was initially intended to take place next week, but is now planned to take place on Thursday 10th May at 7.30pm at The Cossham Hall. Apologies for any confusion or diary clashes that may ensue. What this does mean, however, is that a timely free training event, being offered by CPRE, may be of interest and value to people interested in planning issues, shaped by the new Localism Act.

Details pasted below:

Interested in planning? CPRE are offering a free event in Bristol

Planning our future: The Localism Act and neighbourhood planning

Saturday March 24, 2012

9:30 am to 4:30 pm
Armada House, Telephone Avenue, Bristol BS1 4BQ

Free but booking is required

The Localism Act is intended to give communities a real voice in the planning system. It allows community groups to form ‘Neighbourhood Forums’ and to create Neighbourhood Development Plans, to help shape development in their area.

But how will it work in practice? How much power will community groups really have? And just how will decisions be made about which groups act as the Neighbourhood Forum for their area?

If you are interested in planning and development in your area and you want to learn more about how the Localism Act will work, CPRE is running a conference in Bristol to try to answer those questions. It is open to individuals and community groups who want to learn how to have a real voice in planning for their local area.

Speakers will include Paul Miner (CPRE Senior Planning Campaigner) and Sarah O’Driscoll (Bristol City Council Strategic Planning Service Manager).

There will be talks by ‘front-runner’ groups about the reality of producing Neighbourhood Development Plans, and discussions on the more awkward questions that the Localism Bill has brought up – just what are the limits of Localism? How can community groups effectively involve and engage the people in their area in planning? And can communities really use the Localism Act to say no to unwanted development?

Lunch will be provided – please let us know if you have any dietary requirements.

Places for this event are limited and will be allocated ‘first come first served’.

For more information or to book a place, please contact:

Joe Evans
CPRE Avonside
07854 741130
director@cpreavonside.org.uk

Supporting Communities and Neighbourhoods in Planning is a joint project between CPRE and the National Association of Local Councils, funded by DCLG.

FINAL FINAL CS SUBMISSIONS

PLEASE SEND YOUR FINAL REVISED COMMENTS ON THE CORE STRATEGY TO THE PLANNING INSPECTOR... by Friday Feb 17^th

Save Thornbury’s Green Heritage believe that a pro-forma or highly orchestrated response to the latest changes in the Core Strategy is unlikely to affect the Inspector’s decision.

However, individual/personalised letters or e-mails will undoubtedly carry more weight - using your own style to communicate objections.

The five statements below are all strong, evidenced grounds on which to object. You can include and expand upon all or any of these in your own objections. Paragraph six contains a concluding statement you can adapt, because the inspector is also asking for opinions on how the Core Strategy should be changed in order to make it sound/justified.

The quickest method is probably to cut and paste then personalise as an email.

AREAS OF OBJECTION

• The fundamental problems of insufficient public consultation and an unjustified Sustainability Appraisal have not been addressed in the revised Core Strategy.

• The new evidence added to the Sustainability Appraisal has not altered the existing flawed evidence and its resulting conclusions. eg. (i)The walking distance from Park Farm to the Town Centre is still quoted inaccurately as 15 minutes. The previous Planning Inspector even recognised it was a 25 minute walk. (ii) the ecology of the Park Farm area has not been properly assessed or recognised. As a local resident I know for a fact there are bats, egrets, kingfishers, badgers, etc...commonly sighted.

• The recent Scheduling of the Medieval Fishponds as an Ancient Monument is a very significant achievement for this prized heritage area of Thornbury. Why has this area so inappropriately been chosen as the area for major housing development? There has been no proper recognition of this heritage and historic asset and no re-assessment of the Sustainability Appraisal as a result.

• There has been no review of the Greenbelt around Thornbury. Areas such as Park Farm, containing prized heritage & historic assets, as well as valuable agricultural land, should be brought into the Greenbelt and protected from development. Why hasn’t the Greenbelt been reviewed to include this area?

• The wrong process has been followed with regard to flood risk assessment for Thornbury. Surely with such incomplete knowledge and assessment of all the flood risks in the Park Farm area, a site should not be selected for development?

• Although some changes have been made in this version of the Core Strategy, it is still, in my/our opinion, UNSOUND, with many inaccuracies and unjustified conclusions. Park Farm should be removed from the Core Strategy as a site for development.
  

SEND your responses:-

By Email to: planningLDF@southglos.gov.uk

By letter to: Strategic Planning Policy and Specialist Advice Team, South Gloucestershire Council, PO Box 2081, South Gloucestershire, BS35 9BP

By hand to: South Glos Council Offices in Thornbury.

Please ensure you include your full name and address.

Deadline for reply is Friday 17^th February 2012.

SPECIAL COUNCIL MEETING AND STILL TIME TO RESPOND TO CORE STRATEGY CHANGES.

Cossham Hall was packed to the rafters on Thursday night, the occasion being a special town council meeting called to consider their response to the recently revised Core Strategy for South Glos, as required last year by the planning inspector. Albeit, despite his requests, very little had been changed with regard to Thornbury.

Residents from North West Thornbury had turned out to speak in defence of Park Farm and the need for a proper consultation for the whole town, but without doubt the majority of people attending were from the Morton Way. Apparently three Lib Dem councillors (including our own district representative Clare Fardell) had leafleted that area with what has been described as ‘partisan and scaremongering tactics’, ‘designed to play on their fears of being surrounded by thousands of houses’.

As you can imagine they were rightly concerned and spoke passionately in defence of their neighbourhood and its surroundings. It should be pointed out that at present Morton Way is not included as the council’s preferred site for development in the Core Strategy and was not on the agenda for discussion at the meeting. For the three councillors involved with the leafleting to raise such disquiet and concern unnecessarily, whilst ignoring other sections of the community, hardly seems in keeping with the requirement for them to represent constituents democratically, fairly, ethically, and in an open minded way. Ironically these Councillors are in fact offering a dis-service to Morton Way residents. By failing to engage with the big arguments that clearly render Park Farm the least suitable of all Thornbury’s potential greenfield sites, they are putting at risk all other identified sites including Morton Way.

As the meeting progressed other proposals were made such as the town council not supporting the plan for Thornbury as it stands today, but instead to carry out a proper assesment of all potential brownfield sites available for development, and by using these they would consequently protect all greenfield sites outside the existing footprint of the town. It became increasingly evident that residents from all parts of Thornbury were warming to such proposals regardless of the agenda they had arrived with. It was a pity that such welcome ideas acceptable to almost all those attending fell on stony ground when it came to the council vote. As predicted by one Independent Councillor the Lib Dem group voted en-masse to support the Core Strategy as it stands, regardless, as it is now becoming increasingly apparent, of the wishes of the town as a whole.

At the meeting Independent Councillors put forward the following for the town to consider:-

• Maintain the current footprint of the town and protect all greenfield sites from major new housing developments.
  
• Adopt a policy of brownfield site development (currently no assesment has been carried out) to meet the needs of the town.
  
• Carry out a comprehensive green belt review as required by the planning inspector, and protect valuable assets in the process.
  
• Engage in a Community Plan which will achieve all the foregoing and address the real needs of Thornbury in the forseeable future.

The case they made was rational and documented, with all supporting evidence in place, it offers a measure of protection for the future. It is a great folly by the majority on the town council to disregard such well thought through proposals and fail to recognise the full consequences of their decision. Would it have not been so much better for everybody if the town council had accepted the Independent proposals and include those in the Core Strategy instead of the risks they are currently taking. It does make you wonder what their motivation is.

For all those concerned with the way these issues have been dealt with there’s still time to address your opinions about the Core Strategy to the Independent Inspector. The deadline for writing to him is Friday 17^th February. But don’t be fooled into thinking that he will have much regard for views and opinions that are not backed up by hard evidence. Later this week we will be publishing on this blog 5 strong reasons why SGC has yet again failed to comply with the Inspector’s demands. We have urged South Glos planners and Lib Dem Town Councillors to stop papering over the cracks, but they have declined. The weight now falls on all our shoulders. Does it matter enough to you to take the time to compose a personal letter/email in order to pursue a good and fair outcome for Thornbury? If so we urge you to respond to the Planning Inspector by email or letter at the address below.

By Email: planningLDF@southglos.gov.uk

By letter to: Strategic Planning Policy and Specialist Advice Team, South Gloucestershire Council, PO Box 2081, South Gloucestershire, BS35 9BP