About a year ago we reported here that a planning application for a site for travelling show people in Goldsmith Drive , Rawreth, was refused for Green Belt ard road access reasons.
A new application has now been submitted – application number 13/00118/COU – and you can find the details (and submit comments) here.
From the A Green Read blog:
A Public Meeting is being held on Thursday 3rd January at the Hullbridge Community Centre, in Pooles Lane. The meeting is to start at 7.30pm.This meeting is for residents to discuss and decide what they can say to the consultation, being held by the District Council, about the 500 houses planned for Hullbridge. The Consultation has already started and will finish at 5.00pm on 25 January 2012.It is important that people respond to this consultation based on whether it is “sound” or “legal” The meeting will provide information on these points and assist with questions on the completing the consultation itself.The consultation page at Rochford District Council can be found here.Please come to this meeting and make as many people as possible aware of it. Cllrs Michael & Diane Hoy will be at the meeting to answer questions.
This meeting is very relevant for Rawreth as well – as about half of the “Hullbridge” housing will actually be in Rawreth …
The minutes of the last full council are available on the District Council website . You can find them here.
Chris Black asked a couple of questions and the answers are below:
There are two main things to come out of these questions. First of all, the District Council is willing to protect new open spaces by passing them onto Fields in Trust (the new name for the National Playing Field Association). But we still need to keep a careful eye on this.
The second point is that a new primary school will be needed on the West Rayleigh / Rawreth border.Again we are going to have to keep an eye on this to make certain it is ready at the right time.
(a) Of the Leader of the Council:-
“Policy CLT5 of our Core Strategy begins:-
‘New public open space will be required to accompany additional residential development, having regard to local current and projected future need. Standard Charges may be applied to developments as necessary. In particular the Council will seek the incorporation of a significant amount of public open space to accompany new, and be integrated with existing, residential development in the west of Rayleigh…..’
The creation of Sweyne Park was one of the major successes of the District Council in the last 30 years, and the future of the park has been safeguarded by placing it in the ownership of the National Playing Field Association. (Now known as ‘Fields In Trust’)
Does the Council plan to protect new open spaces created under CLT5 in the same way as with Sweyne Park, and transfer the ownership of them as quickly as possible to Fields In Trust, whilst continuing to manage them ourselves?”The Leader, Cllr T G Cutmore, responded as follows:-
“I agree with the general presumption outlined in the question and at this point in time cannot see any reason to change a policy which, as Cllr Black states, has been successfully applied over a number of years. However, there may be other opportunities available at the time to look at other organisational trust arrangements and /or work with the Parishes/Town Council/local residents on such arrangements which guarantee that public open spaces remain as such in perpetuity.”By way of supplementary question Cllr C I Black asked if any discussion had taken place with Fields In Trust in relation to new spaces created under CLT5 to move them away from ownership by developers.
The Leader confirmed that he saw no reason for any new public open spaces created to remain with developers, as indicated in the response to the original question.
(b) Of the Portfolio Holder for Planning and Transportation:-
“It is very likely that the planned development in West Rayleigh will result in the need to either enlarge St Nicholas School (which has been specifically designed for future expansion) or to build a completely new primary school.
How do we ensure that this new facility is available when the new houses are first occupied?”
The Portfolio Holder, Cllr K H Hudson, responded as follows:-
“The Core Strategy appendix H1 sets out details of new infrastructure and services to accompany residential development. Following consultation with the schools service, it was confirmed the proposed housing development in West Rayleigh would generate the requirement for a new primary school.
The schools service will be closely involved in the provision of facilities for new school places and, in particular, the phased provision of those to relate to the construction of the new homes. It is understood that the aim is to ensure that school places are available as homes are occupied rather than seeing all new places being immediately available when it may be some years before those places are required.
In order to provide as full an answer as possible to Cllr Black’s question the schools service has been contacted and they have responded as follows “it would not be possible to open it [a new school] prior to the housing development being occupied. There are the practical issues of servicing and access to the [agreed school] site and then the need to consider when there would be critical mass to make a new school viable.”
By way of supplementary question Cllr C I Black asked if the Portfolio Holder recognised the need to be alert to potential problems that could arise with this subject.
The Portfolio Holder confirmed the need to always be alert.
One of the issues discussed at the LDF sub-committee last night was about which land should be used for new industrial / commercial / office uses in the future.
It was agreed that:
These recommendations now go to full council.
At the District Council Development Committee tonight there were 4 decisions taken:
First of all, there was a scheme for 5 homes in Hawkwell, on a narrow strip of land between Park Gardens and Hawkwell Park Drive. There was a good cross-party discussion on the planning merits of this one. The general feeling was that it was over-development, as evinced by the possible impact on two oak trees, and because the sewer would have to be under council land, rather than under land owned by the applicant. Ward councillors John and Christine Mason successfully moved refusal.
Next was an application for a new gatehouse at the entrance to “The Lawns” in Rochford. The old one was built in a rush at the start of World War 2. It has a fine architectural design but was of poor build quality (eg no dampcourse) and has become uninhabitable. The question was , was the proposed replacement building of sufficient architectural quality for such a location? Officers felt it wasn’t well-designed, but most members felt it was. Ward councillor Gill Lucas Gill successfully moved approval.
Third on the list was a proposal for a new takeaway in London Road Rayleigh, on the corener of Danbury Road. A previous application with opening hours until 11pm was refused by an inspector. However this new scheme was for opening hours until only 7 pm and was passed tonight
Finally, there was an application for a second smoking shelter at the Chichester in Rawreth. This was refused on Green Belt grounds.
A government inspector came today to hold a hearing into the appeal for the travellers site application on the A1245 in Rawreth. It was a polite, well-mannered affair.
It was held in one of the council committee rooms in Rayleigh, starting at 10 am. The discussions finished just before 1 pm, and then a visit was made to the site in the afternoon. In the meantime the inspector drove around the area, not only the A1245 itself, but the London Road shops, Church Road, Rawreth Lane and Asda.
There were 10 people present:
We discussed each of the issues in turn. The applicants concentrated on the fact that County Highways were no longer objecting. They also pointed out that the LDF site allocations document last year included this land as a possible location for a traveller site – and all the possible sites were in the Green Belt, so why not use this one?
The Council (and councillors) maintained that this was an important Green belt buffer, and that the highways safety issues shoudln’t be ignored. Development in the Green Belt is only allowed in very special circumstances.
The inspector will now go and write his report. You don’t get a decision on the day!
There’s still time to comment on the council’s latest consultation on the core strategy.
You can find all the stuff on the consultation here
In particular you can download the document that we are being consulted on here (299k)
The closing date for replying is 5:00 pm on 11th July 2011. So you still have time to comment – and you can see some of the responses so far here
This was discussed last night at Rawreth Parish Council . Although they naturally concentrated on the west of the district, they did think about aspects that affect the whole district – and they praised District Councillor John Mason for his efforts. They were also concerned that last years consultation seems to have been completely ignored and shelved.
Putting it simply, the District Council are proposing building on ‘land north of London Road’ , the Parish Council prefer a smaller site in the centre of Rawreth. And the Parish Council felt that the District’s consultation document was unfairly weighted in favour of the “North of London Road” site. Also they feel that the risk of flooding hasn’t been addressed properly.
We can certainly see why the Parish Coucnil feel like this.
For example the document says one of the good things about their proposed site is that:
The quantum of development that can be delivered in this location provides sufficient economies of scale to fund/develop
facilities required by the community, including a primary school, public open space and other community facilities.
- but actually there’s got quite a lot of open space already in this area. And even if 770 houses were built here, that wouldn’t require a new primary school – especially as St Nicholas School in Priory Chase was especially designed to have the capability to expand.
Also the document says about their site:
Some areas within this location are within flood zone 3, however it is likely that development can be accommodated outside of
the flood prone area.
It’s only ‘likely‘ that development will be out of the flood zone?! Are the district council implying that it would be OK for some of the housing to be built in the flood zone?
Meanwhile the document seems to miss out a lot of the good things about the Rawreth site:
The planning application for 12 caravan pitches on the A1245 in Rawreth is being recommended for approval by officers.
The item comes up at the Development meeting on October 21st, as part of a pretty crowded agenda. You can download the agenda here. (2.75 Mb).
We will be writing a more detailed review of the agenda later tonight – so we are disabling comments on this for now.
We’ve been pretty successful in opposing the District Council’s original idea of 1800 -2000 more houses in Rayleigh – that number is now cut to 770. But things still aren’t OK yet.
The council plans to build 220 homes where Rawreth Industrial Estate is, and create new employment land elsewhere. That seems reasonable. But they also plan 550 homes on land “North of London Road”, which means somewhere between London Road, Rawreth Lane, and the old A130. We are very concerned that once builders encroach on any of that farmland, they won’t stop until it’s all built on.
The council has now published some detailed proposals for West Rayleigh/Rawreth, including 5 possible sites for the 550 houses, different possible sites to replace the Industrial Estate, and 2 possible sites in this area for travellers. We’ve prepared the sketch map to try to explain things.
We say:
Using the Rawreth Industrial Estate for housing is probably OK if the businesses there are treated properly.
The green fields between London Road and Rawreth Lane should be left alone. NO houses, NO employment land, NO traveller sites there!
The previously used land on the A1245 is a better choice for housing (see the top of the map).
A good place for a new industrial site is at the junction of the A1245 and the A127 (bottom left corner of the map).
For the travellers, there are some very small sites spread across the district that could be used instead if necessary.
Residents have the legal right to object – but it’s been difficult to do so, because the council’s website is tricky to use. However we have now got the agreement of the council that you can object by email . But time is very limited – objections have to be in by April 30th.
If you can, please send the council your comments:
either on the district council website at http://rochford.jdi-consult.net/ldf/
or email the council at planning.policy@rochford.gov.uk (include your name and address)
Do this before April 30th !
The council’s housing options are labelled NLR1 to NLR5. If you wish, you could say that you object to options NLR1, NLR2, NLR3, NLR4 and NLR5 because they will:
cause an unnecessary loss of agricultural land,
will increase traffic,
will create an green belt boundary that can’t be defended in future
and encourage a merging between Rayleigh and Rawreth.
You can also object to the traveller sites and the employment land.
The traveller options for this land are all for small-scale sites – options GT1, GT2, and GT3 .
It’s difficult to summarise all the ideas that the District Council has for Rawreth / West Rayleigh on one map – when there are 5 possible sites for 550 houses, several sites that could be used as employment land to replace the Rawreth Industrial Estate, and 2 possible sites for travellers.
But we’ve had a go:
The Liberal Democrat councillors are taking the view that the green fields between Rawreth Lane, London Road and the old A130 should be left alone completely. NO housing, NO employment land , NO traveller sites.
We Say:
Using the Rawreth Industrial Estate for housing is probably OK if the businesses there are treated properly.
The green fields between London Road and Rawreth Lane should be left alone. NO houses, NO employment land, NO traveller sites there!
The previously used land on the A1245 is a better choice for housing (see the top of the map).
A good place for a new industrial site is at the junction of the A1245 and the A127 (bottom left corner of the map).
For the travellers, there are some very small sites spread across the district that could be used instead.
We’ve already written a lot about the District Council’s “Core Strategy” . That’s the master plan for future development into the 2020s , including:
550 homes ‘North of London Road’ (plus 220 on Rawreth Industrial Estate) – between 2015 and 2021
600 homes in ‘West Rochford’ (plus more at Stambridge Mills) – between now and 2021
50 homes in ‘West Hockley’ 9 (plus more on the Eldon Way Industrial Estate) – before 2015
175 homes in “South Hawkwell” – before 2015
100 homes in “East Ashingdon” – before 2015
500 homes in “South West Hullbridge” – from 2015 onwards into the 2020s
60 homes in “South Canewdon” – between 2015 and 2021
500 homes in “South East Ashingdon” – after 2021
250 homes in “West Great Wakering” (Plus more at the Star Lane Industrial Estate)- after 2021
The council has now produced its discussion documents for exactly where this housing and other development would go.
You can download them from this webpage.
For example, for “Land North of London Road” it sets out 5 options. We show below the maps from the council document, together with the council’s own descriptions. The green areas on the maps are for “Residential, incorporating provision for education, public open
space, youth and community facilities and play space”. (We will be writing about other areas and other issues in other pieces on onlinefocus – there’s far too much to include in one item here.)
The options for land “North of London Road” are:
Google Map showing NLR1
Google Map showing NLR2
Google Map showing NLR3
Google Map showing NLR4
Google Map showing NLR5
Here’s some initial thoughts on these:
We’ve just had the following email tonight from the Rawreth Parish Clerk:
Just to remind everyone that the Parish Council are holding a survey of car movements along both Beeches Road/Watery lane and Rawreth lane over a twelve hour period, 7am to 7pm on Thursday the 25th of March 2010. We are still looking for volunteers to help collect this information and basically all you need to be able to do is count and spare two hours of your day. It is planned to break the day into 2 hour shifts consisting of two people per shift, and we are planning to collect data from three points, the entrance to Rawreth Playing Fields, Rawreth Lane, the junction of Priory Chase and Rawreth Lane, and the junction of Chelmsford Road and Beeches Road, so thirty six people in total are neededThe Local Development Framework (Core Strategy) Public Enquiry is now expected to take place in the middle of May 2010 and it is therefore imperative that we have this information as part of our representation.
If you can offer your help please contact me by email or phone 01268 631821 (please leave a message if the answer phone is on with your name and number and I will return the call) .
Thank you in advance and please spread the word to anyone who does not have access to the Internet. or those who do not live in the Parish but will still be affected should these developments be approved.
Regards Hayley
We are Liberal Democrat councillors and campaigners in Rochford District.
We want to improve local decision-making and we see onlineFOCUS as a good way of keep residents informed and involved.
Please click here to email us .
Ron Oatham
Trevor Parrett
Bruce Smart
Chris Stanley
Pam Waldie
Elena Black
If you want information on a particular planning application, you can find it on the District Council website here.
If you want to know what new planning applications have been submitted this week, click here.
If you want to report a problem, you can email Lib Dems councillors by clicking here.
There's also an independent website called FixMyStreet. It's very good for reporting minor street problems like holes in the road, grafitti or failed streetlights. You can find FixMyStreet here.
Rochford District Council carries out grass cutting on behalf of the County Council.
If you see a grass verge that badly needs cutting, you can report it
here.
This is the official master document for planning policy in our district! To download it, click here
click here. (2.5mb)
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