Local Plan 2040 Draft Plan - Strategy options and draft policies consultation

Object

Representation ID: 7364

Received: 20/09/2021

Respondent: St Neots Town Council

The plan is predominantly inward-looking and does not adequately address cross border planning issues. Settlements of the scale proposed at Wyboston and Little Barford cannot exist in isolation. These settlements will be located only a kilometre from the St Neots border and about 3km from the town centre. For comparison, they will be over 10km from the Bedford Town Border. Despite this the proposed Bedford Borough Local Plan 2040 makes no mention of St Neots, neither has Bedford Borough Council made any effort to engage with the Town Council or our residents.

The projections for the Wyboston development in this plan also appears to significantly underestimate the eventual size of the settlements. While the plan states that Wyboston development has a size of 2500 homes, the same site is openly being marketed by Taylor Wimpey as “Dennybrook Garden Village” with an eventual size of 10800 homes.

Central Bedfordshire Council’s Draft Local Plan also includes a 7000 home development in Tempsford in addition to the new Wyboston and Little Barford settlements proposed here.

It is the view of St Neots Town Council that building up to 20,000 new homes this close will have a far-reaching impact on St Neots residents and services but without the economic benefits such as community infrastructure levy and council tax receipts.

In addition to a written response to the points raised here, St Neots Town Council requests
that a presentation is made to councillors to further discuss the points raised here and what
mitigations will be introduced to both reduce impact and realise the benefit to St Neots.

Support

Representation ID: 7365

Received: 20/09/2021

Respondent: St Neots Town Council

This planning process also seems premature regarding the considerable uncertainty due to the ongoing OxCamArc Spatial Framework and East-West Rail consultations. Given that one of the high-level objectives of the OxCamArc is:

“To realise the full opportunities – and overcome the challenges – will require coordination of planning functions across the region. Local councils cannot do this on their own because of the level of coordination needed across the area, and because they do not have all the levers needed to develop a genuinely integrated plan. Government needs to play a supporting role to bring together a strategic approach at the Arc level to support better planning and ultimately better outcomes for the economy, environment and communities.”

St Neots Town Council is concerned that this Local Plan pre-empts those consultations, and goes against this spirit of region-wide planning. We are disappointed that no attempt has been made from Bedford Borough Council to engage with St Neots Town Council during the consultation phase for the 2040 plan.