Residents win fight over housing plans (From Gazette Series)

Residents win fight over housing plans

BERKELEY residents have been saved from having 300 houses built on their doorstep.

Stroud District Council planners have counted up the number of homes built or committed to in the last year and have concluded that fewer homes are required in this planning period than previously thought.

It now means that the Berkeley proposal, along with similar plans for Brimscombe, Stonehouse and Stroud, will be dropped from the Local Plan.

Councillors will be asked to vote to remove the controversial proposals from the draft Local Plan at their meeting on Thursday.

John Stanton, chairman of protest group ABRAID, told the Gazette yesterday he was delighted that the threat to Berkeley had gone away.

"We are so pleased that common sense has prevailed and this has been stopped," he said.

"The inspector and the council were just playing a numbers game with Berkeley - it was clearly an inappropriate site."

Cllr Barbara Tait (Con, Painswick) SDC member for planning, welcomed the fact that building would not now go ahead on the controversial sites.

She said: "This is good news for those communities who had already made strong objections to the inspector's recommendations.

"I am delighted that we don't now have to build on these greenfield sites." Mr Stanton was just as pleased that planners were also recommending that the council reject the inspector's view that Berkeley be designated a principal settlement.

He added: "This is absolutely key. There are eight settlements in the district larger than Berkeley that are not principal settlements.

"Taking that threat away basically precludes any big development from being built in the town."

In addition to assessing the housing figures, planners concluded that building such a large development in the town would be against government policy.

Employment opportunities in the area have decreased and the policy opposes major housing growth in such areas.

Mr Stanton said: "This just shows how flawed the inspector's report was. It was a nonsense and it has now been discredited."

Councillors are fully expected to throw out the Berkeley proposals along with the other controversial plans on Thursday but Mr Stanton is well aware that he cannot afford to take his eye off the ball.

"The immediate danger has gone," he said, "But there is a chance that the developer could appeal against what is going to happen.

"Also, this planning period ends in 2011 and it won't be long until they start thinking about what to do in the next one.

"Clearly we need housing for people in Berkeley but it has to be in scale with the town."