produced by the community, for the community

Daniel James

Don’t Strangle Stroud (DSS)


 www.new-­town.info

Eastington’s New Settlement:  West of Stonehouse (WoS)


…..or should that be North of Eastington (NoE)? - Ed


Many parishioners will know by now that the Inspector has approved Stroud District Council’s (SDC’s) Local Plan.  The Local Plan will be endorsed by SDC on the 19th November.  1,350 houses West of Stonehouse will now certainly be built over the next 15 years or so. This development will also include a significant increase in employment-land adjacent to the existing industrial site.


Of course I, and many others, are very disappointed with this decision, but that decision has been made because of the significant pressure for new housing across the country, driven by the unprecedented growth in our population, along with the decision to make the largest allocation in Eastington.


The ONS state as follows (29 October 2015) :-

Overall, this means that we are projecting that the population of the UK will increase by 9.7 million people (15%) over the next 25 years. Of the 9.7 million… 4.7 million (49%) is due to projected natural change and 5.0 million (51%) is due to projected net migration.”



For us locally we now need to work with SDC and the developers, Hitchens, to create an attractive estate, which avoids coalescence with the hamlets of Nastend and Nupend, and at the same time creating at least some connectivity to Stonehouse, consistent with the Inspectors decision and SDC policy.


With this is mind our local District Councillor, Stephen Davies, has agreed to lead the negotiations with SDC to support the best possible outcome for our local community. Stephen is keen to harness local enthusiastic residents who have an interest in, and knowledge of, good planning as well as councillors from all the wards directly affected and in addition, councillors who have a particular interest in the best possible outcome for this strategic site.  The Parish Council continues to support professional expertise from a Planning Consultant, Ian Stuart, enabling his expert knowledge to be available to Stephen to ensure our parish is represented to best effect.


Currently our Parish has almost 700 houses and about 1,500 people. When WoS has been completed we will have over 2,000 houses and a population around 4,700:  About three times the size.


The new site will have some shops and a new primary school. The road through the site leads to the Industrial estate with plans for an additional 2,000 jobs. The jobs and new houses together will almost double the current traffic on the A419 (before considering any potential effect from the newly proposed Eco-tricity site). For all of us who are aware of the constraints on this road at peak times, it is obvious that access to both Stonehouse, Stroud and beyond will be severely restricted at times. As the economy improves the Department of Transport suggest that current base traffic will grow by an additional annual amount of 2% each year.

 

WoS and natural traffic growth will result in additional traffic through Eastington, Frocester and Kings Stanley as drivers seek to avoid the congestion. District Councillor Stephen Davies, and those of us supporting him, will need to work closely with SDC to ensure everything possible is done to minimise the effects of these dramatic increase in traffic volumes.


Of course the community will be affected in other ways: will the Parish continue with the current boundaries, given that the major centre of population will move to the northern part of the Parish? what relationship will the new school have with Eastington Primary School? what effect will the new shops and services have on Eastington facilities and Stonehouse town Centre? what will the relationship be between Stonehouse and this “urban extension” which has no connectivity to the town centre? These are just some of the questions that at this stage remain unanswered.


The threat of WoS has always felt very negative, but now that the decision has been made we need to work hard to turn this threat into an opportunity, and work together with the District Council and the developers to make the very best of this significant change to our parish and wider community.

No. 154  Dec’15-Jan 2016