Planners Defer Decision on Sidings 2

At the Council Planning meeting on Wednesday, 18th January, Council Members overturned the Council Officers’ recommendation to accept the planning application by Taylor-Woodrow to build 136 houses as the first tranche of building on the ‘Sidings 2’ site.

The attack was led by Councillor Marion Drake and supported by Nick Hawkins (Chairman of the R&M Association, who was able to speak due to a petition having been raised against the development). The Community Council, which did not have the right to speak, was represented by Cllr Judith Marsh. The Council has been involved at all stages and endorsed the representations which pointed out to Members that the plans showed an overdevelopment of the site (more in line with London densities). There was inadequate parking provision; the proposed ‘courtyards’ were not being built to public highway standards and would not be adopted by the council but would fall under the control of a management company (yet to be defined); Waste Management had offered no comments, which meant that the practicality of access by refuse trucks etc was unproven and also that the positioning and usage of wheelie bins was unclear; and that the security of the site was poor, with pathways designed with doglegs and uncertainty over the lighting of some of the public areas. One of the responses by the developer to the security issue was to propose to ‘gate off’ various areas. As Councillor Drake pointed out, ‘gating’ areas is a response to a problem which should not occur if the site was properly designed.

The Council Members were extremely sympathetic to all the concerns raised and asked many pertinent questions. They would probably have liked to have thrown out the whole application, but this was not technically possible due to many of the fundamental issues (including the traffic implications) having been ‘lost’ when Outline Planning Consent was granted in 2002. Consequently, consideration of the application was deferred for one month for the police to be fully consulted on the safety, lighting and security issues. (The police had, in fact, issued a statement that they had ‘no comment’ on the design, but Members doubted that the plans had been looked at in sufficient detail).

It is certain that this development, hopefully with amendments, will be approved in the near future but there will be many meetings over the next month aimed at removing the worst aspects of the design. The developers (and Council Officers) have also been given a clear message about designs for the rest of the site.