Local Plan 2011-2031 Proposed Submission Draft

I am a Knebworth resident deeply concerned not about development in the village, but the sheer scale of development planned.

Very broadly, the plan seeks to increase the number of dwellings in Knebworth by some 30%. This is a huge number that will change the village enormously, and furthermore, seems to be a much higher percentage of increase than any surrounding village is to experience, plus the towns of Hitchin, Baldock and Letchworth.

Knebworth is already a village under great pressure, just servicing its current population! Trains are packed (with only two extra trains planned to come into service at peak times in 2018, but with less seats than the trains that currently serve us), our GP has a four week plus waiting list, and the village is networked by small, single lane roads only, that are just not suitable for greater volumes of traffic.

This huge number of additional dwellings will create a blight on the village for more than decade, whilst large scale construction is in process delivering some 600 homes to a village that only currently has 2,000.

I wholeheartedly agree that development is required, but the scale of that proposed is entirely NOT in keeping with the village, its environment, facilities and it is certainly not good for the residents that have made Knebworth their home.

So, I would contend that the number of dwellings is revisited, with a further bias toward already heavily developed urban area, rather than continue this drive to reducing an historic village to another shapeless town.