Local Plan 2011-2031 Proposed Submission Draft

1. Sections I am commenting upon are at the back on page. This is the context of the plan for Baldock and particular the plan for some 2,800 homes in the Bygrave area. I remain of the view that the overall development is far too large for town the size and character of Baldock and that to concentrate so many new homes in one location are as is still proposed creates dead and challenges that the plan does not and cannot give any assurance will be addressed eg in health and transport.

2. I wish to comment on the linkage between the transport aspects of the Plan and air quality and wider non road transport. In 9.28 the plan recognises the issue in central Baldock . The Baldock Surgery Patent Participation group drew attention to this in its previous comments on the plan in 2015 and to its impact on the incidence of childhood asthma.

3. I also wish to comment on general planning and delivery issues.

4. It may well be that the measures proposed for new road links from and around the Bygrave Rd development (in 13.29 and 13.30 ) with help to mitigate the road traffic impact especially in the peak travel to work periods but that will not be sufficient . The new development will contain many private cars. If Clothall common is anything to go by an average (probably in all three sense of the term especially the " mode" ) of 2 per household. So upwards of 5,000 cars. In the evenings and at weekends these will cluster in the town centre, whether at the "pinchpoint" referred to in the plan or not. This will be much more so than at peak times even if the new roads are successful with traffic queues and congestion as people go to local shops Tescos, etc .

5. When weather conditions are poor the lower lying parts of Baldock will be more saturated than normally with exhaust fumes. ( This has even been visible in the last few days of the cold spell even with modest traffic.)Walking into Baldock from Bygrave may not be a real choice especially for families given this. Modelling and surveying existing traffic patterns from Clothall Common and from the areas towards the A1M in Baldock the will give you some clues as to the likely traffic streams from within the town at these times itself not just transiting or in travel to work periods. The increased population will itself generate new external traffic as demand in Tescos etc also increases - more customers, more goods, more deliveries, more vehicles.

6. Something radical will need to be done to separate cars from people in the centre of the town and it cannot wait until the later part of the planning period. This will not be easy with so many residents living in the centre who also have cars and will be controversial requiring some really high quality design to enable "normal" local neighbourhood road traffic still to happen.

7. The other area of concern is rail services. It is not clear whether the strategic transport section covers them. Many (most?) of those moving to Baldock will be expecting to use the fast services to London and Cambridge on or off-peak as well as the links to other stations in Hertfordshire. It is one of the factors that will draw them here as well as the quality of life in the town. The rail Franchisees , who will change over time, need to be involved with NHDC over the whole planning period to ensure that their plans respond to increased demand. Some form of joint strategic working or joint machinery would seem to be in order to ensure consistency in assumptions , plans projections and timeliness of delivery. The recent proposal to cut all fast off peak services to and from Baldock suggests this is urgent. This runs quite counter to the needs of the plan and is ill-judged.

8. Some joint machinery and project specific liaison with the NHS is also called for specifically to ensure that primary and community health service planning is joined up and consistent. Is the existing machinery adequate and sufficiently local focused and does it have the right people on it for this task?

9. As the largest single housing development in the plan is in Baldock, 2,800 in the Bygrave Rd area this needs to have the best and most joined up process and project and programme management if it is to be delivered. It is far less incremental than the others in its own terms and relative to the size of the Town. While I still consider the proposed development in the Bygrave Rd area to be too big, unwieldy and risky "if you are going to do this damned silly thing.." do please go about it in a thorough and sensible manner to make it work and not in a " damned silly way". I assume you do want to deliver it?

10. So the outline trajectories shown in Figure 6 need to be deconstructed and made more locally specific and integral to the plan . There need to be clear demographic assumptions about the population of people who are expected to move into Baldock as those will drive health ,education, transport and other service planning and design. "Wait and see" guarantees you get it wrong . Even if the assumptions are not absolutely correct ( they won't be) if you have an intelligent researched set of baseline assumptions you at least have some benchmarks to monitor so plans can be made and adjusted as you go.

11. There needs to be a named Baldock Town Project Manager or Director with the experience and skills to bring it all together and to gain the confidence of the people in Baldock- present and future. They need to feel that the plan will be sound and responsive to their evolving needs and concerns. If a local person with those qualities could be found so much the better. Retention of corporate memory over this time will be important as organisational change can lead to a planning hiatus leaving projects like this hanging in the air part delivered and poorly so.

Sections referred to are:

13.29 The Station Road / Clothall Road / Royston Road junction is identified as pinch point in the Council's transport modelling. Provision of a new road associated with BA1 linking the A507 with the A505 will help mitigate this issue enabling movement from north to east without the need to use the junction.
13.30 Additionally a southern link road is also proposed to enable the development of BA3 and BA4 but also improving connectivity to the south of the town providing the ability to bypass this junction.

*Strategic Transport - The scale of growth within the District will result in a significant number of new trips on a transport network that is already under stress in certain areas. Congestion issues are particularly focused within Hitchin and junctions relating to the A1(M). Not only as a result of growth in North Hertfordshire, but also in relation to existing issues and development in nearby authorities. There is a clear need to focus on promoting sustainable travel modes to limit the impacts of growth whilst delivering significant physical mitigation measures. Our transport modelling has helped to identify 11 specific schemes that will be required in the District over the period to 2031 as well as other schemes in neighbouring Stevenage which are influenced by this Plan's proposals[151].

* The health authorities will need to ensure there are the right medical facilities at the right time;

* 9.28 The policy addresses the protection of the health of the residents of proposed developments, as well as the protection of the residents of existing properties particularly, although not exclusively, those that live in close proximity to the District's roads. In addition to the air quality problems identified in Hitchin that are associated with elevated nitrogen dioxide (NO2), levels of NO2 are close to exceeding a national air quality objective around the A505 in the Hitchin Street / Whitehorse Street area of Baldock. Furthermore, particulate matter air pollution is a public health concern, which is reflected by the presence of a national air quality objective and a public health outcome indicator.