LPCS Summary for Here for Hereford 12 May 2013
Here for Hereford’s summary response to the Council’s final Questionnaire on the draft Core Strategy / Local Plan proposals.
Here for Hereford sent its Local Plan Core Strategy response to the Council this April.
The Draft Local Plan sets the scene for development and infrastructure in Herefordshire up to 2031. It has been the subject of numerous consultations and briefing papers, dating back to 2008. Here for Hereford has been involved since 2010 when proposals for 18,500 new homes and the Western Inner Relief Road were first promoted by the Council.
We have held a series of meetings to discuss the emerging Local Plan. Eighteen months ago we helped to promote a questionnaire used by many across the County to tell the Council what they thought of the Local Plan proposals. 84% opposed the scale of the housing plans; 88% opposed the Inner Western Relief Road; 93% expected plans for water provision, and 94% expected plans for additional hospital bed capacity to be in place, before adopting the Local Plan housing growth proposals.
The Council acknowledges that the problems of water provision and treatment may still inhibit their development plans, and it has reduced the number of additional homes from 18,500 to 16,500. However, major questions about deliverability remain, and other issues about finance, governance and accountability have made the latest and final round of consultation over the Local Plan sometimes seem irrelevant.
Here for Hereford tries to be positive in all it does, and their approach to this consultation was no different. We had a great response to our Local Plan/Core Strategy meeting held at Breinton Village Hall on 23rd March, despite snowstorms making travel difficult. We issued another questionnaire (similar to the previous one from November 2011) which people were asked to complete and send off to the Council. We were pleased that other Ward Councillors adopted a similar approach. We also circulated a questionnaire on the proposed Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL) which is designed to help fund the Infrastructure Delivery Plan.
The themes from the meeting provided the basis for the Here for Hereford response to the Council’s draft Local Plan.
- We recommend that the number of additional homes in the Hereford locality should be limited to 3,800, the figure already identified as being appropriate as far as water provision is concerned.
- Unless the Council scales down its housing proposals overall, the Plan will not pass the Planning Inspectorate’s Examination in Public in time for the CIL Charging Schedule to be implemented. Further financial problems for the Council will follow and developers could have a ‘free ride’.
- Sustainable transport measures should be fully supported and extended
- The Inner Western Relief Road proposal’s evidence base is outdated, and the reasonable alternative of a ‘No Road option’ has not been tested
- The existing road network should be fully repaired before incurring major new road costs
- Here for Hereford welcomes the intention to protect the County’s unique heritage and environmental assets and looks forward to studying the Habitat Regulations Assessment which has yet to be published
The Infrastructure Delivery Plan provoked bemusement. In our response, we said:
(i) It is unlikely that substantial government funding will be available to boost development levy funding and it is misleading to suggest that it will be.
(ii) The policy should be honest about what can be achieved. Its population and economic projections need to be revised downwards.
(iii) Alternatives should be pursued to replace the disproportionately expensive, and environmentally damaging proposal for an Inner Western Relief Road.
(iv) Public expressions of support for increased hospital bed capacity must be addressed if any large scale housing proposals are to be endorsed.
Finally, we commented that the consultation process for this last opportunity for people to comment on the Local Plan has been conducted with a sense of irritation, lacking in earlier processes. Intemperate language has been used by certain Cabinet members. The documents presented were overlong and repetitious; finding a way through them was complicated; General Overview and Scrutiny and other committees might have improved them, had they had a chance to look at them in a timely manner before the consultation period opened on 4th March. Completing the Council’s questionnaire was a daunting prospect, even for those with easy access to the Internet. It will be interesting to discover the response rate from the public when the results are made available in June. We shall report on this as soon as possible, and on the responses from such statutory bodies as English Heritage and the Highways Agency, who continue to raise concerns over substantial parts of the draft Local Plan.
