March 2009 - Public Meeting on Planning

Representatives from Swindon Borough Council's Forward Planning Department visited us in the Village Hall.

The officers took questions on Swindon's Core Strategy, the plans for the Eastern Development Area, Coate Water and the Swindon town centre regeneration.

Highlights

A full report will be prepared by the Parish Council in due course. In the meantime, here are some of the highlights:

• The area from Liddington and Ham Road as far as the hospital is an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty and there will be no developments on that land. The doubts of concerned villagers were assured on this point.
• The Eastern Development is unlikely to start until 2012 as a result of the recession and is unlikely to be complete with 12,000 houses until 2035. The dates may change but the range is interesting.
• There will be traffic problems at Commonhead Roundabout and in "rat runs" through the village. The Parish Council will be working with the Planners to mitigate the impacts there. The Planners will share traffic models and we will be staying very close to this one.
• Coate Water development has been pased to the Secretary of State with a recommendation for rejection. However, even if rejected, the expectation is that there will be new plans for 750 houses behind the hospital.

Thank You!

The Parish Council would like to thank the Planners for giving up their evening for us. They were very open and honest in their opinions and assessments and this has been our experience with them in the past. So, a big thanks  to Dave Potter and his team.

And also thanks to the 30+ villagers who participated in the evening.

Anne Snelgrove addressed the Liddington Parish Council on her activities that affect our village. She gave us an insight on the Eastern Development and Coate Water from an MP's perspective. We briefed her about our concerns on rat-runs arising from the Eastern Development and our concern that an Area of Outstanding National Beauty should not be impacted upon, even for an access road!

We also discussed the potential impacts of an upcoming Bill that will affect the Liddington Parish Council - more on this later in the year.

The councillors briefed Anne on local issues such as the B4192 crossing, Planning issues and local flooding.

We would like to thank her for giving us so much time and offering to follow-up for us where she can use her office. Thanks Anne!