Spooner Row Message Board

I would like to ask the following question at the forthcoming GNLP meeting to be held in Broadland next Monday

Can the board please explain what exactly is meant by ‘reasonable alternatives’ as outlined in the report and what weight will the respective planning departments be expected to give to developers using this category in applications?

By way of illustration the preferred allocations for Wymondham are for a minimum of 100 houses but the report goes onto give a list of so called ‘reasonable alternatives’ which total nearly 10,000. How can this be in anyway considered a reasonable alternative?

Developers will simply see this as an opportunity and planning Departments will be under pressure to accede to applications otherwise what is the point of them being listed.

Julian Halls

Wymondham Town councillor and Wymondham south District councillor

Answers given by the Board Exactly as typed

The sustainability appraisal and plan making process require the consideration of reasonable alternatives to help inform choices and demonstrate why the preferred options have been chosen

Q 42 of the consultation specifically asks for comments on growth issues for Wymondham and the other main towns. Comments received will help firm up the final plan for submission to Government.

Any planning applications determined before the adoption of the GNLP ,scheduled for late 2022, will be determined in accordance with the current adopted plan unless there are material considerations that indicate otherwise. The inclusion of sites as reasonable alternatives in the emerging GNLP would be expected to have very limited weight in determining planning applications

My comments

Thank goodness for the last sentence but the rest is gobbledegook or simple avoidance.

Para graph 1 Why do they have to so many ’reasonable’ alternatives and what choices will there be made if we are only supposed to get over a 100 houses? The question as to how this can be considered reasonable is completely avoided, as is the comment as to why so many are being listed in the first place.

The second paragraph answers nothing

No opportunity was given at the meeting to comment upon the response given

 Meeting today at SDC decided to proceed with seperate  village cluster plan,

New community council area is our village cluster and looking for 1500 NEW houses over ALL south Norfolk area, about 100 parishes and anything larger than 30 houses per cluster is UNLIKELY to happen but work in progress . Implementation date if all goes well is 2022 and valid until 2038

Perhaps the penny has dropped.   According to an article in today's Evening News,  entitled "Will our city need a new hospital"? it expresses concerns over the impact of so much proposed development contained in the GNLP.   These concerns were apparently raised at a Norwich City Council sustainable development panel yesterday.   How many  people have been telling them that the current N&N is inadequate and it is quite understandable that it cannot cope now with the pressure of patients.  Why haven't we seen an article like this months/years ago ?    It is not rocket science.

For reference, here is a link to a thread on this message board for a previous public consultation dated October to December 2018 https://spoonerrow.activeboard.com/t65047528/greater-norwich-local-plan-regulation-18-public-consultation/

The Spooner Row Site numbers are GNLP 2082, GNLP 2101 and GNLP 2181

I also contacted the GNLP about the lack of a South Norfolk Village Clusters document (whatever that is) to comment on in this Consultation. This is the reply: 

The decision has only recently been made to pursue the separate South Norfolk Village Clusters document, so at the moment there isn’t a set timetable.  A call for additional small sites is being made through the main GNLP document (consultation 29 January to 16 March), so to a certain extent the timetable will be influenced by the number of extra sites that come forward and need to be assessed; however, the aim is to follow as closely as possible the GNLP timetable.  When the timetable is agreed the Council’s Local Development Scheme (LDS) will be updated accordingly.

A separate Regulation 18 consultation on the South Norfolk Village Clusters will be held in due course, although for the reasons set out above this will be after the close of the current GNLP consultation period.

Kind Regards,

Kate Fisher
Senior Planning Policy Officer
t 533801 e kfisher@s-norfolk.gov.uk 

Update of Reg and Planning committee which was held yesterday at South Norfolk, FOR THE VILLAGE CLUSTERS. Please note , given the vast number of previous updates from our District councillors in council matters NOT, that this is happening and I hope keeping you in the loop , even if the loop is very confusing.

This is my summary of the KEY points although like many Planning documents there is MUCH scope for intepretation and dare I say bending of the rules to suit. That applies both for development and against

There are a number of issues to consider and I have listed them below as bullet points BUT please read the Reg and Planning committee notes and aganda on the south Norfolk website if you want the full picture which yesterday entered the public domain

• The starting point seems to be the existence of a primary school and takes into account its accessibilty and numbers in attendance but for South Norfolk this is not the only key driver as we have almost twice the number of parishes (118) when compared to Broadland. It is the school that that largely defines what a cluster is.
• Bearing in mind the above there is also reliance placed upon what other factors are deemed to be important called the Land assessment. In summary called the HELAA. Using a traffic light system it looks at  number of constraints and impacts when assessing site suitability. They are respectively:- access to site, access to local service and facilities,, Utilities capacity, Utilities infrastructure, land contamination, Flood risks and market attractiveness ( also coastal impacts!) and for impacts :- Landscape/Townscape, Bio and Geo diversity, Historic environment, open sapce , Transport and roads and compatibility with neighbouring sites. ( Unfortunately there are no simple rules like 3 red flags and you are out and the example given was one single amber was enough to bin the application at Chapel lane in Wymondham)
• Each site will be assessed against these criteria
• Windfall developments which do not count to the overall delivery but looking at 1-3 houses per cluster are to be permitted in addition to allocation
• SMALL sites of a minimum 12 units up to 24 per hectare only to be allowed . VERY rarely anything bigger which is why all the submitted sites TO BE considered are all being written to see if they still want to proceed. This does not apply to anything already approved.
• A MINIMUM of 1200 new houses for the South Norfolk village clusters up 2038
• The final list of shortlisted sites to be ready by july 2020 ( I have my doubts that is achievable )

It is hoped , but I doubt this, that we will be able to play catch with the rest of the GNDP consultation programme

Lots more I could say but by now I suspect you are all losing the will to live so I will stop