Normandy, Surrey

How do I participate in GBC Local Plan Consultation?

GBC Key Objectives

• Develop and grow borough economy – Surrey Science Park has central commercial role – Town as a regional retail hub remains important

• Develop housing to address current backlog and future economic growth – Land in the west of the borough has been highlighted;

previously protected Green Belt agricultural land to be released for housing and commercial development; push housing development out of Guildford into surrounding villages

• Manage travel growth and future patterns – Reduce reliance on car; address town centre and A3 congestion;

reduce carbon emissions from transport

• Add infrastructure to support growth

Why Consultation?

• Statutory duty to consult residents – Do you agree/disagree we have collected all the

evidence or have we missed something? – Do you agree/disagree with our analysis or are there

any other ways we could analyse evidence to produce different proposals?

– Do you agree/disagree with what we are proposing?

• Proposals will not be withdrawn… – Unless there is compelling new evidence – Might be modified in the face of strong planning

reasons we might have missed and/or alternative analysis

What GBC suggest you do

• Read “Local Plan Strategy, Sites Issues and Options”

– Read “Appendix A”

• the borough strengths and weaknesses report

– Read “Appendix B”

• all the 27 evidence documents!

– Read “Appendix D”

• contains the 8 Normandy site descriptions

What GBC suggests you do

• Complete the questionnaire – evaluate 21 objectives, 28 sets of options, 67 potential

development sites (inc. 8 Normandy sites) • Cross-refer to the evidence when answering 11 sections containing

41 questions: there are no ‘reject outright’ options – SECTION 1: Understanding the borough of Guildford – SECTION 2: Planning for the homes we need – SECTION 3: Planning for the economy and jobs – SECTION 4: Planning for access and transport – SECTION 5: Planning for infrastructure and services – SECTION 6: Planning for the environment – SECTION 7: Planning for our town and villages – SECTION 8:Cross boundary issues – SECTION 9: Planning for sites and spatial options – SECTION 10: Making it happen – SECTION 11: Any other views?

What NAG suggests you do

• Concentrate on what’s important to Normandy – Why do we score so highly in the Settlement Hierarchy?

– What is it about the scoring system?

– Why remove Green Belt status from Normandy by ‘insetting’?

– Why change the settlement boundary by adding the Green Belt sites?

– What’s so good about the 8 potential development sites? – Site 43 – to rear of North Wyke Farm near end of Westwood Lane – Site 44 – to rear of The Old Vicarage, Wyke and houses on Guildford Road – Site 45 - to rear of Greenacres Farm adjacent to Scout hut and opposite Normandy Motorcycles – Site 46 - to rear of executive homes built on former Anchor Inn site – Site 47 - behind Pusseys Copse through to Westwood Lane – Site 48 – to rear of The Paddocks adjacent to the railway line – Site 49 - to rear of properties in Green Lane East and Westwood Lane down to Beech Lane including

Lynwood Nurseries – Site 68 - field used as paddock and the amenity lake to north of railway line adjacent to railway road

bridge towards Strawberry Farm

What NAG suggests you do

– What if the proposed development sites exacerbate community separateness rather than enhance community cohesion? • Will the proposed developments give us a village centre that was a key

criteria for the settlement hierarchy? • Will the proposed development simply add to the five separate

hamlets?

– What if the train operator closes the railway station in the future anyway?

– What ‘planning gain’ might we get in return for accepting new housing development e.g. a village shop?

– What reasons might be developed to encourage GBC to • reduce the number of potential development sites? • reduce the housing density on any of the proposed sites? • encourage GBC to develop elsewhere first?

Doing nothing is not an option (unless you want this)

• Estimated Proposed Housing Development – 2011 Census

• Detached: 661 50.5% • Semi detached: 374 28.5% • Terraced: 58 4.4% • Flat: 34 2.6% • Mobile homes etc: 183 14.0% • Total homes: 1310

– Across all 8 Normandy sites (modelled dph per property type) • Detached w/double garage: 28 (8 dph) 4% • Semi-detached: 384 (18 dph) 54%

– w/single garage: 256 (16 dph) [36%] – w/no garage: 128 (20 dph) [18%]

• Terraced: 182 (24 dph) 25% • Flats/apartments 125 (36 dph) 17% • Total homes: 719 (18/19 dph)

The Trip Wires

• Settlement Hierarchy – A method of ranking settlements as suitable for development – Criteria are for urbanisation not countryside protection

• Sustainability Indicators – Scores for access to services, facilities and employment

» Shops, Schools, Libraries, Places of worship » Doctors’ surgery, Dentist » Children’s play areas » Public houses, Restaurants » Community hall » Post offices, Banks » Bus service, Railway stations » Local employment, Wider employment

– Who decided on the criteria score values as they weight the result disproportionately towards settlements that already have some urban type services e.g. 5 for a railway station not 1 for a railway station

• Functional score – How well the village works as a community

» Parish council questionnaire

The Trip Wires

• Settlement Hierarchy (contd) – Normandy ends up as the fourth hippest place in the

whole of the known universe • Why?

– Look at our Settlement Hierarchy scores

– Look at the assessment of our community submitted to GBC by our Parish Council via the 2010 questionnaire

• Do you agree with the methodology? – If not, give reasons

» its biased against sustaining the Green Belt

» what if the scoring values were changed?

– Suggest an alternative

» criteria that protect countryside in the Green Belt

The Trip Wires

• Sustainability – Assessment of each development site to determine

walking distance to nearest • Local centre (e.g. village square, pub, shops) • Primary school • Healthcare facility • A-road • Railway station • Amenity open space • Village hall • School facility

– Why not assess cycling distance? – Do you agree with this methodology?

If not, give reasons why

The Trip Wires

• Settlement Boundaries – Settlement boundaries to be changed to include the

Green Belt land identified for development

• Insetting – Village settlements removed from the Green Belt so

that they can be exploited more easily

• Rural Exception Sites – Those sites that would not usually secure planning

permission for housing e.g. agricultural land next to but not within a local settlement area

The Trip Wires

• Rural Exception Sites – Planning Policy Statement 3 (PPS3)

• Aim should be to deliver high quality housing that contributes to the creation and maintenance of sustainable rural communities in market towns and villages

– Development Plan Documents [DPD] • May allow for the development of small sites within rural areas

solely for affordable housing, which would not otherwise be released for general market housing

– Rural exception sites should only be used for affordable housing in perpetuity • Address the needs of the local community by accommodating

households who are either current residents or have an existing family or employment connection, whilst also ensuring that rural areas continue to develop as sustainable, mixed, inclusive communities

The Trip Wires

• Affordable housing – All sites are required to take affordable housing

• GBC are asking if content should go up from 35% to 40% • GBC would like some sites to be 100% affordable housing • Most affordable housing is rented, some shared ownership

– 10 dwelling threshold for affordable housing • GBC are asking if threshold should go down to 5 • Developer obliged to include if over threshold • Developers known to split sites to increase market housing

– Site threshold 0.4 ha • Developer can avoid affordable homes if below the site size

threshold

The Trip Wires

• Affordable Housing (contd)

– Pegasus report indicates 724 dwellings across all 8 of Normandy’s sites

– At 40%, affordable housing 290, market housing 444

The Trip Wires

• Housing density

– Target of 30 dwellings per hectare (dph)

• Hectare is 100 x 100 metres (10,000 sq metres)

– Pegasus: 724 dwellings, 38.6 hectares, 19 dph average

– GBC maximum of 30 dph would mean…

1,158 dwellings!

The Trip Wires • Housing density (contd)

– What is being proposed at Ash Lodge Drive?

• Up to 400 homes on 22.1 hectares @ 18 dph

The Trip Wires

• Housing Density (contd) – How many homes can you fit into a hectare with

gardens, off-street parking, roadways and services? • Ask a developer but here’s a model based on the dwelling

plot sizes in the Ash Lodge Drive outline development documentation – Detached with double garage: 8 dph – Semi-detached

» with single garages: 16 dph » with off-street parking: 20 dph

– Terraced with parking spaces: 24 dph – Apartments (2-storey) with parking spaces: 36 dph

• N.B. apartments reduce density of dwellings (it’s the built footprint that goes down as the number of homes goes up)

The Trip Wires

• Suitable Alternative Natural Greenspace (SANG) – SANGs are existing open spaces that have been identified

for enhancement so that they can be made more accessible and attractive to visitors • It’s a planning fix so that LPAs can convert perfectly good quality

Grade 3 farmland into public open space simply to permit housing and other development in the Green Belt

– The hope is that by providing alternative areas for outdoor recreation, it will help reduce the impact on the Thames Basin Heaths as new households can use the SANG, instead of the protected heathland • The Ash/Pirbright ranges will never be available for high levels of

public access, if at all, so why should they be available as the basis of SANG mitigation?

The Trip Wires

• SANG (contd) – As far as Normandy is concerned SANG is both a

defence and a threat • Defence – no development on Normandy’s Green Belt land

unless SANG is in place

• Threat – SANG is the mitigation/offset that will enable development in the Green Belt to proceed – Russell Place Farm in Frog Grove Lane, Wood Street has

submitted a planning application to make 34.5 hectares of farmland SANG (13/P/01453)

– 24 hectares of Green Belt land adjacent to the Ash Lodge Drive development is being bought by the developer to offer to GBC as SANG