Page 6 - Herald August 2024

APPLICATION FOR 170 DWELLINGS OFF FOSTON ROAD/LEICESTER ROAD
APPROVED BY BLABY DISTRICT COUNCIL
Steve Wharton Gas Services
Mobile:
07802 680014
Telephone:
0116 2478658
Gas Safe Registration No. 168811
6 THE NEW COUNTESTHORPE HERALD
AUGUST 2024
STOP PRESS
Countesthorpe Parish Councillors attended Blaby District Council’s Planning Committee meeting on 25th July to make representation on the Foston Road application. However, the District Council’s Committee resolved to approve the application. In its statement to the District Council’s Committee, the Parish Council expressed its sincere concerns that mitigation measures to respond to the adverse impact on already stretched local services, infrastructure, road safety, flooding etc arising from further development, had not been taken seriously by the District and County Councils. The main reason for the District Council making its decision to approve the application was that it could not currently demonstrate its five-year housing supply, mainly as development had stalled in other previously approved areas, which in balance it considered outweighed the loss of countryside in Countesthorpe. The full statement by the Parish
Council is published on our website at the following link and republished here.
AC ACCOUNTING
Accountancy
Countesthorpe Parish Council Statement - Foston Road Countesthorpe Parish Council earnestly requests that you refuse this application. The report makes it clear that your officers are very aware of most of the reasons why Countesthorpe should not have further housing but nevertheless recommend the application is approved, ignoring our concerns and those of 700 residents. Setting aside a few minor issues to fulfil the housing requirement may be acceptable but not a whole raft of major issues!
Countesthorpe has already exceeded its minimum requirement for housing. Allowing this development would further exceed this requirement.
This overprovision of residential development within the non-PUA, far in excess of the minimum requirement for one of the Larger Central Villages, will cause harm to the spatial strategy which cannot be mitigated by the needs of the 5-year land supply.
Particularly as this site is not an allocated site for housing development and is located outside of the Settlement Boundary of Countesthorpe on land designated as
Countryside on the Blaby District Local Plan Policies Map (2019).
While you acknowledge that there are no key employment sites, it is also true that Countesthorpe does not have access to a range of transport modes nor does it have a good functional relationship with higher order centres. It merely has one bus service which runs between South Wigston and Leicester, unreliable since the closure of the South Wigston depot. Buses are frequently late or cancelled, especially when flooding occurs at Crow Mills. This does not fulfil the imperative to reduce the need to travel by car.
Policy CS11 states that the Council will work to ensure that development provides the necessary infrastructure, services and facilities to meet the needs of the community, and mitigate any adverse impacts of development (including transport CS10)
While it can be seen that funds may be provided to meet the immediate effects of the development in terms of health, education, sport, sewage etc, the only highways infrastructure improvement (apart from the roundabout necessitated by the development itself) is directed towards South Wigston and Hospital Lane.
No highway improvements have been suggested for Countesthorpe itself, while the Local Cycling and Walking Infrastructure Plan for the south of Leicestershire shows that the entire length of Station Road in Countesthorpe has been given a poor walking and wheeling audit score and marked in red, making it clear that significant improvement is needed on this, the main route through the village.
You have not given sufficient weight to flooding risks.
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Taxation
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