We’ve been fairly quiet during the election period. With the decisions over the future of the Garrison already made, and all the major parties committing to significant house building and agreeing the importance of providing suitable infrastructure alongside the houses there was a lot less to discuss. Certainly whilst the results have caused much discussion in the media we’re expecting business as usual without the controversies over housing numbers not being cut, and the significant uncertainty that the cancellation of the REME move to South Wales brought that followed the election in 2010. With the fully Conservative administration we’re very much in the housing model of the previous coalition government where there are no formal regional housing targets as favoured by Labour, but councils are strongly encouraged to build through the land supply rules and being offered a bonus for building new homes. Locally all the key players retained their seats or were not up for election this year, so the election period was merely a pause!
Things get going again very swiftly on Tuesday 19th May with the next Arborfield Community Forum held as usual at Henry Street Garden Centre in Arborfield from 7pm to 8:45pm. The main part of the meeting will be a presentation from Crest Nicholson on the first reserved matters planning application, and we expect this to be very similar to the presentation on the same subject that they gave to the Arborfield Parish Meeting a few weeks ago.
As those of you who were at the meeting will be aware the first development location is slightly unexpected in that they are choosing to develop over on the north eastern side of the Garrison adjacent to the lake, so in an area that is going to require demolition of some buildings before they can commence building houses. They are proposing to build their part of the Nine Mile Ride extension from close to the school site across to the A327, but they are not proposing to develop any of the areas alongside the road or around the proposed district centre until the new road is in place. This does of course mean that with the opening date of the school a fixed date in September next year that there will need to be some careful planning of development around the Nine Mile Ride extension and the district centre as if building in those areas doesn’t commence until the Nine Mile Ride extension is complete it will almost certainly be taking place once students are attending the school. The parental reference group set up by the council are of course well aware of this and we understand that their main focus is on ensuring that the developer and the council provide safe routes for the children to the school through the building site and the surrounding development areas as a first priority.
Responses at the Arborfield Parish Meeting to the proposals was generally positive, and certainly at this stage Crest Nicholson seem keen to keep a dialogue open with local residents. Perhaps the biggest reaction came to the answer to a question about whether there would be public fishing allowed in the lake when Crest Nicholson said they had been told that the MoD were going to remove all the fish from the lake as they were MoD property! Other points that came up at the Arborfield Parish Meeting which may well come up again this week were that even with the significant numbers of houses being built in Wokingham, Reading and surrounding boroughs we still do not have enough new houses to go over the threshold for a new hospital or even any sort of extension to the Royal Berkshire Hospital. There was also some discussion of the various road schemes, and it was highlighted that because the Arborfield Bypass is being funded by money obtained by the council rather than the developer we will not have to wait for the previous threshold of houses built before the road is provided. The council intends to keep moving forward and open the road as soon as possible. Whilst this won’t remove the trucks and vehicles associated with the development from travelling through Arborfield village altogether, they certainly will stop a lot sooner than if we had to wait for the developer to achieve a fixed threshold.
In other news, we have received a couple of enquiries about a large protected tree that was cut down and hedgerow removed between the MoD owned land and the service road for the houses along Sheerlands Road. The hedgerow and tree were replaced with a significant fence that now runs for part of the length of the hedgerow leaving a gap at the end. Whilst there have been cases previously where the developers have cut down trees, and parts of that hedgerow have previously appeared on plans as for removal, the most recent plans retained that hedgerow and all the trees following feedback from residents on that part of Sheerlands Road that wanted the significant green barrier between themselves and Sheerlands Road to remain. All the trees in and around the Garrison have had Tree Protection Orders applied to them as well, something which the developer is well aware of. At the time when concerns were raised with us we made enquiries via the council and were assured by the developer that they were not responsible. Speaking with Gary Cowan our borough councillor he has confirmed that it was not the developers and that the matter had been passed to planning enforcement. Â However Gary did add that there were two gates in the removed hedgerow that were removed and not replaced, and which were used by pedestrians walking up and down Sheerlands Road, if you have used these gates at any time for getting to or from Sheerlands Road, can you get in contact with Gary, or contact us and we can pass on details, as although the gates weren’t an official right of way they have been in existence long enough to be regarded as permissive routes, however the council needs comments from residents who have used the gates to confirm that they have used them.
