Local Plan 2011-2031 Proposed Submission Draft

I wish the express my deep concerns and objections to part of the Local Plan for Barkway concerning the building of some 140 new houses on the site identified as BK3. I write as a resident of the village for nearly 25 years. During my time in the village, I have been actively involved in an official capacity in a large number of community organisations including; Barkway School, Barkway village hall, and Barkway Church, which have given me considerable knowledge of the village community and its resources.

The Council's plan proposes a massive housing estate relative to the current size of the village, and I believe it is not only disproportionate but contravenes many of the council's own policies as well as the National Planning Policy. From the plans made available to date, I believe that the design and placing of the estate will be a major blight on an historic village with a currently vibrant community and create a complete division within the village. For a village of this size to successfully integrate the number of people living within such a estate, it would require significantly more resources than will be available in Barkway. A lack of integration is likely to significantly increase social issues within the village and would be a breakdown of the strong community sprit which those of us who live in the village value and have worked hard to achieve. This is not sustainable housing. I believe it is patently obvious that people who currently chose to live in Barkway do so as they wish to be part of a small community and value the heritage and rural feel of the village. If we wanted to live near a major, modern housing estate, we would live in a town. There is strong resentment and much anxiety being generated that we are having such a large housing estate foisted on the village simply to 'make up the numbers' rather than being properly considered and planned as sustainable housing should be as stated in the government's own framework.

Specifically I would like to point out the areas where this plan breaches national and local policies.
There are no plans to improve the minimal public transport servicing the village. As someone with a (secondary) school-aged child to get to school and who works outside of the village, I know how limited public transport is. Realistically, it is extremely likely and highly probably that for each adult moving into the proposed housing estate there will be at least one additional car on the local roads to access facilities in neighbouring towns and villages which are not available in Barkway (food/clothing stores/middle and secondary schooling/doctors etc). This does not seem to have been taken into account in the plans which show limited parking for residents let alone visitors. The additional traffic / parking would also impair the quality of life of those living in the village and would inevitably create an increased risk of road accident and injury. This would breach NPPF30,NPP34, NPPF35, NOOF 38 and NPPF95 as well as NHDC policy SP 6 - sustainable transport, as well as sustainability objection 2c and NHDC policy 29.

Small is beautiful where Barkway is concerned, but not even the village's strongest supporters can argue that it has a wealth of amenities. The BK3 proposal does nothing to either maintain or improve local amenities. Schooling is only available within the village up to year 4 and with other housing developments within recent years bringing new people to the village, the school may be unable to accommodate the BK3 residents' children anyway. On these grounds the proposed estate contravenes NPPF38, 55 and 72. As a resident I see no potential benefit to the village at all, only a negative impact.

There is no indication that the proposed housing estate will create any new employment or support economic growth, which is required according to the NPPF at paragraph 17. The estate may even have a negative impact on the Newsells Stud Farm business, and so should not go ahead.

The proposed housing estate will also contravene the council's own statements and NPPF 11 due to its negative impact and appearance on the Chiltern Ridge, leading into Barkway, which the council has previously stated needs to be protected. BK3 will clearly be not just a negative but also a significant impact on the locality's appearance, and cannot be reconciled with the council's stated aims for the area. Additionally the estate is completely contrary to the existing linear nature of historical development of the village and so will particularly grate and stand out as inappropriate.

I also wish to register my anger and dismay at the council's plan to extend the permitted development boundary so that BK3 can be included as part of the village. This feels an underhand and undemocratic approach and is likely to generate further antipathy towards the estate and increase the village's sense of grievance at what appears to be an arbitrary development, ill-thought out and introduced without proper consideration for either planning policy or local wishes. The site has been ruled as inappropriate for development against the council and governments own criteria and simply to relax or ignore these criteria will create an estate which will not be sustainable - for all the good reasons it has previously been deemed as inappropriate! I am not against any new houses being built in the village, but to be sustainable within a community such as Barkway, any development must follow planning policy (which this proposed estate does not) and must be proportionate to the existing community (which this proposed estate is not).

The Council have also not accepted the village Neighbourhood Plan, which also contravenes paragraph 17 of the NPPF.

This proposed housing estate is not, in the Minister for Planning's own words, 'change for the better' and I sincerely hope that the genuine concerns raised by the village will be listened to and this proposal rejected. I would add that I thorough support the stance and arguments put forward by Barkway Parish Council, whose view, I believe, accurately reflects not only my own, but the views of many within this historic community.