Green campaign groups have hit out at housing development plans for Nantwich which they label “grossly excessive”.
And they are now seeking “high level” meetings with Cheshire East Council in a bid to fight the proposals.
Greville Watts, Crewe and Nantwich representative for Council for Protection of Rural England (CPRE), spoke out as residents in Stapeley prepare to campaign against the latest plan for farmland near their homes.
Muller and Jones Homes wants to build hundreds of homes and business units on a “Nantwich South” site off Peter de Stapleigh Way, west of the Stapeley Water Gardens site.
It’s the third major housing scheme to come to light in Nantwich in the last few weeks.
Reaseheath College unveiled intentions to sell off land for potential housing near Kingsley Village, and Gladman Properties want to build 200 homes on land off Queen’s Drive.
Mr Watts, also a member of South Cheshire Friends of the Earth (FoE), said: “We intend to seek a high level meeting with Cheshire East planners to assess how they view these development proposals and try to get their agreement that collectively they are grossly excessive in relation to Nantwich’s real housing needs.
“The consumption of farmland, which we believe should be retained for future food and fodder production, amenity and landscape value, water retention and flood prevention, is also unacceptable, particularly when brown (previously-developed) land is available close to town centres.
“We believe Nantwich’s need is primarily for affordable housing, but also for some mixed development incorporating employment and leisure opportunities.
“We will argue strongly that the “saved” policies of the former Borough should predominate until the Cheshire East new Local Development Framework is approved.”
He said much depends on how the National Planning Policy Framework is worded when it appears in April this year.
Janet Perry, of South Cheshire Friends of the Earth, added: “Our main concern is that farmland is being allocated for this housing because we as a nation must preserve this land to be able to feed ourselves in the future.
“Planning permission has been granted for brownfield sites in towns like Crewe and these sites should be used first.”
Stapeley resident and campaigner Adele West said: “The proposed area for the build is beautiful prime farming, green belt land. There is no investment, no jobs, amenities or schools in place that could support this build and the current infrastructure would struggle.
“The area designated has wide-ranging wildlife habitats such as hedgerows, copses, trees and ponds. The loss of these habitats would have a catastrophic affect.”
Another resident Pat Cullen has set up a site www.protectstapeley.org.uk with posts of the latest plans, meetings and other developments.
Muller and Jones are due to present their plans at Nantwich Town Council meeting tonight (February 6) at Brookfield Hall, off Shrewbridge Road, from 7pm.
There is no such thing as affordable housing in Stapeley and how the developers dare to suggest they will be providing this when it is quite clearly building another estate of luxury 5/6 bed houses is quite ludicrous. They should be forced to build 2/3 bed mews houses on brown field sites (Focus site?) where house prices are more affordable. We need to build houses that our children can afford to buy in their home town, not to encourage more rich people to move into the area. This is all about developers making fat profits and not the needs of the community.
Well said Fred. Nantwich must be seen as easy pickings for housing developers. The Council does not seem to have any concerns for existing residents. Further demonstrated by the way they have allowed the Regents Business Park to operate on an inappropriate site with substandard accesses.
As someone who moved from Essex where there was a similar massive development (Great Notley Garden Village) the same concerns were raised, people were up in arms and there were petitions, protests and debate. They built it anyway 🙁 Sadly it seems the money that the developers bring is enough to sway the planners.
Failing that, perhaps we should start up a great crested newt intensive breeding programme then ‘release them into the wild’ I know a good map of green fields they could go into 😉
Joking aside, are they just going to build this anyway, no matter how much we protest?
It is quite understandable that there is public outcry about all the proposed development projects in and around Nantwich, but what about the developments that are being introduced by stealth which no one appears to be bothered about.
I am refering to the businee park / village at elim / regents park in london road / crewe road.
This enterprise is now in operation, not paying business rates as planning permission has not yet been applied for.
According to a representative of cheshire east planning, he is of the opinion that despite any opposition retrospective planning permission will be granted as jobs are being created.
Can someone please tell me what has happened to Nantwich as it was a democratic community before, and we had the right to be notified of any change of use to property which would affect the local community, this appears to have gone.
I think I agree with you Fred. However, I’m wondering if there is some sort of breach of planning protocol at the Regents/Elim site as it seems the local residents were not consulted at all regarding this business park which is now in operation. I wonder why Stapeley residents have been given the chance to comment on the proposals in their area, but the residents surrounding the Regents/Elim site have not been afforded the same rights.
Sorry, final rant – this is building design by numbers and for the good of planning permission rather than the needs of a community.
See the ‘community centre’ and the business units. Just thrown in there, no thought or idea of what it will actually do for the community. I wonder if these developers even know that the current Pub is struggling and there has been an empty commercial unit on Stapeley for god-knows-how-long, or the ‘community centre’ we were promised 12 years ago hasn’t yet been opened, but has already been vandalised.
Or that Stapeley already has business units, or that most people to afford to live in Stapeley have to commute to get a job that pays enough to pay the mortgage…
I should probably stop now…..
I just went to their website and spent 20 minutes typing my opinions. When I went to submit I receive a message saying “invalid characters” – as I had purposely left out all punctuation, I can only suggest that they aren’t really bothered about opinions.
Also, the biggest question that no-one seems to have addressed, is that all the primary schools in the area are at capacity. So, how are these extra children going to be provided for?