4.88

I am a resident of Wilstead.

My initial and very important comment is that Wilstead is still designated a “Key Service Centre”. As I recall in one of the first Local Plans Wilstead “achieved” this status based on the Council’s weighting rules. Because, at that time, we had a (part-time) doctor and had allotments and playing fields these inflated Wilstead’s “score”. At the time the council did not recognise that the doctor was only part-time and allocated a weighting for a doctor. We no longer have a doctor in the village.

Wilstead is very poorly served by any services. We do not have a doctor and the bus services are woefully inadequate. And we only have one shop and a pharmacy. In the Local Plan 2040 it states “In rural areas, Key Service Centres also perform the role of local centres and are important in serving their surrounding rural areas”.

I do not see how Wilstead can serve the surrounding rural area, since we have no services in the village.

To describe Wilstead as a “Key Service Centre” is misleading and factually incorrect.

Wilstead should be “downgraded” from a “Key Service Centre” to reflect the reality of the situation.

This development poses a danger that it will (along with HOU15 & HOU16) ultimately encroach on Wilstead and we will be left as just small “suburb” of a sprawling urban “town”, with no facilities.

I see no provision whatsoever for any new surgeries or medical centres.

So, to impose this development onto Wilstead is complete madness because (as I have already described) Wilstead has no facilities and the result will be a sprawling town with no services to support the population.

The Local Plan 2040 must be amended to provide better services and these services must be provided in the very first stages of the developments so that the services are available to the new residents. Otherwise, experience warns us that the services are reduced or ignored in the actual development.

I disagree with the plan for Shortstown expansion to the west. This is green belt agricultural land and Shortstown is already struggling to cope with the large amount of houses added to it which have caused various problems traffic through the A600 bottleneck to the A421 with its accident blackspot being only one of many.

It is impossible to see how sustainable transport links would be made with Wixams. Wilstead will become a major route through.
Any travel from Shortstown to Wixams will require movements through Cotton End and Wilstead, particularly down Cotton End Road in Wilstead.
Development on the Wilshamstead parish boundary will add to the urbanisation of the area already possible as a result of Policy HOU 16

I do not like the countryside being destroyed. However, given that people need homes, I do not object to new housing at College Farm, Shortstown. New homes should be maximally insulated, with high standards of eco-friendliness. Excellent walking and cycling paths must be included.