A PLANNING blueprint that would see thousands of new homes built on Green Belt sites in east Bristol should be rejected, town and parish councillors say.
South Gloucestershire Council’s draft Local Plan has been drawn up to set out where developers should be allowed to build more than 22,000 new homes over the next 15 years.
It includes proposals to allow 1,000 new homes to be built in Warmley, nearly 2,000 in Shortwood, 800 in Oldland Common and Bitton and 2,050 near Lyde Green as well as hundreds more in Mangotsfield, Hanham and Wick.
Some of the town and parish councils affected have made formal objections to the plan, claiming that it is not “sound and deliverable”.
A final public consultation on the Local Plan closed in April, with campaigners from the group Save Our Green Spaces South Gloucestershire (SOGS-SG) handing in 167 handwritten responses at Kingswood Civic Centre on the final day.
These, plus the 437 online comments will be submitted with the plan to the government for scrutiny by a planning inspector next year.
Siston Parish Council said in its response that the current infrastructure “cannot support the excessive number of homes proposed”.
The parish boundaries include all the planned North Warmley New Neighbourhood and part of the Carsons Green and Rockhouse Farm New Neighbourhood development sites at Shortwood.
The council said: “The significant reduction in Green Belt areas will reduce biodiversity, increase flood risks, diminish air and water quality, and limit carbon dioxide absorption. These negative impacts contradict claims that the plan will future proof the community against climate change, regardless of the build quality of new homes.”
It pointed out that some residents already live in a designated Air Quality Management Area, “where levels of nitrogen dioxide are so high as to be a threat to human health” and infrastructure was “already significantly overloaded, particularly the A4174”.
The parish council said South Gloucestershire Council had not proved any “special circumstances” to justify the impact on Green Belt areas within the parish, which would have to accept extensive housing development while other areas “retained uninterrupted Green Belt status”.
Emersons Green Town Council has said its members do not believe the plan is “sound and deliverable” – the two criteria the inspector has to decide on.
The town council said: “The strategy is far too reliant on a small number of large-scale developments to meet the identified housing needs.
It said the experience of delays building Lyde Green’s schools and the lack of new medical services for the area showed that relying on developers to provide or contribute to the infrastructure and services needed was “problematic” – more time and money was needed to ensure infrastructure was put in place, “if it happens at all”.
The town council said site designated ‘significant’ Green Belt land has been “conveniently downgraded”, so that development “would not be deemed urban sprawl”.
Pucklechurch Parish Council said: “SGC might claim to want what local people want but consultation feedback shows how little they have listened to these people.
“Much of the housing at these new neighbourhoods will be beyond the financial reach of residents on average wages or who currently live in poor housing or unstable tenancies, the very people with housing needs that this plan is meant to address.
“The overall impression is the eastern fringe developments are being driven by profit hungry developers at the expense of local people and the planet.”
The parish council said congestion, flooding, air quality and wildlife would all be affected.
It said: “The focus on urban expansion along the East and Northern Fringes by releasing prime green belt land for development can only be described as a developers’ dream, while disadvantaging many South Gloucestershire communities.”
Launching the consultation in March, South Gloucestershire cabinet councillor Chris Willmore said: “We accept that not everyone will like everything in the Plan; some of the decisions we have had to make have been very difficult. We share local people’s passion to protect the character of the places they love to live. But we would be doing those people and the next generations a disservice if we simply tried to put up a roadblock to any new building.”