This appraisal is flawed. I have taken the comments of Staploe Parish council, which I have read and understand and added some additional comments.
If we use numbers (2,1,0,0,-1,-2) to replace Bedford Borough Council’s “scoring” (++,+,0,?,X,XX) and assume that all criteria have equal weight, the options can be totalled and compared. Option 2a is best and scores 7. Option 6 is worst and scores -9.
The other points are of note:
1. Of the 15 criteria, 7 criteria have the same score for all options, so make no difference to the assessment. These include 2. Protecting and maintain biodiversity and 8. Landscape character.
2. 2. Of the remaining 8 criteria where scores vary between options, 3 are effectively the same: 1. Air Quality; 3. Reduce CO2; 15. Reduce travel/promote sustainable transport. So in reality, of the 15 criteria only 6 criteria make a difference. [Question for the Planners: Is this reasonable or sufficient?]
3. In the favoured options 2a to 2d, BBC have failed fully to consider the true impact of new settlements (incl. Dennybrook) on:
a. 6. Promoting Bedford as a town centre – all options 2 and 3 score the same, but new settlements such as Dennybrook will push people to St. Neots, not Bedford. As a resident of Honeydon I can confirm that we rarely visit Bedford, and neither do our neighbours.
b. 8. Landscape character – all options score the same and the words fail to fully recognise the impact of new settlements on the existing landscape.
c. 9. Max development on brownfield/avoid loss of agricultural land – despite the loss of agricultural land at Wyboston being highlighted in the words, this is not recognised in the scoring of 2b and 2d as these are the same as 2a.
Shockingly the words say for all options “Although most new development is likely to be on greenfield land” – it seems that Bedford Borough Council happily accept this and have made no effort to maximise use of their stock of brownfield land (eg. 70ha at Twinwoods) – contrary to the NPPF.