Comment on new Local Plan proposals

Cllr Bob Barr provided the following comment to the Warrington Guardian in response to the updated Local Plan proposals:

Warrington Liberal Democrats broadly welcome the changes that have been proposed in the Local Plan and look forward to studying the full document in detail. Many of the changes reflect comments from the public and us, though there is disappointment that they don't go far enough. The Rethinking South Warrington's Future Group on Facebook, the Warrington South Parishes Working Group and Our Green Warrington have all been pressing for many of the changes proposed.

Realistically, for the plan to have any chance of getting through the examination in public, the government's minimum housing supply figure needs to be complied with. However by bringing on more brownfield land, building at greater densities in the town centre and using the opportunity provided by the closure of Fiddlers Ferry, the potential loss of Green Belt has been minimised to 5%.

We welcome the removal of the South West Urban Extension from the plan. We would like to see the Garden Suburb broken up into a number of smaller, self-contained Garden Villages each with the infrastructure to let children walk to school, residents to shop and work locally. and have easy access to medical and leisure services. We fear that developers will still be keen to use the plan to build large housing estates without the necessary infrastructure or community facilities.

We look forward to participating actively in the coming consultation.

The full article can be read here.