GC POLICY 4: MEETING HOUSING NEEDS

I am sending my comments on garden communities, though I don't believe they will be heard.

I agree that new housing helps, however 7,500 come on!! Garden community has started building these houses in Elmstead Market prices ranging from £350,000 to £500,000 anyone with any common sense knows this is out of middle class price range, oh but there are some social houses incorporated in the build, I'm guessing 3 per cent. The garden community is a developers paradise for an upper class community, there are 3 estates built around me now without any infrastructure at all, so doctor surgeries none incorporated in the planning schools none incorporated in the planning roads no new roads built to take the ever increasing traffic, the tcb can gloss the website as much as they like but action speak louder than words, from a personal point of view I am not overly concerned that the Elmstead country side is being buried in bricks and concrete by the time it is complete me like a lot of other residents would have moved away to somewhere that developers can't make their millions in profits without putting the residents before profits. Honesty is always the best policy so be more transparent on how building 7500 houses actually helps a community without including infrastructure. Not to mention additional air pollution in such a tight area

comments re new development

The New development has been prepared with out thought on how the infrastructure is going to be available, we are struggling at the moment to live and get medical treatment as the hospitals and doctors are over whelmed with no capacity to treat the population as it is.
The village of Elmstead which has nothing but one shop and over subscribed doctors and not much else.
This project has been badly thought up it does not help normal people with housing ,just greedy builders who are jumping on the band wagon to build houses that the majority cannot afford. No thought has gone into how our village can manage with the volume of traffic when most local people have to travel to gat any medical treatment shopping and other important essentials availability to better their lives. The village has already grown to twice its size with new homes.

Elmstead will become out cast from all these things that are necessary to survive. The air pollution will become intolerable to many of our village with medical problems. No thought has gone into our villages, infrastructure for roads crossings and just to maintain quality of life. The increased traffic will cause more accidents and people not being able to access medical help via ambulances re the traffic which is going to cause delays . people will die.

Elmstead will become isolated with no way of getting to Colchester for the essentials to maintain a quality of life that we expect.

These buildings are not for the local populous but for out siders who have no empathy with the way of life that we have all struggled to achieve in our small village good quality of life and a peaceful existence., good air quality. We are aware that things need change but Colchester has built so many house without any more hospitals schools dentists and doctors as it is we have to wait 5/6 weeks for a doctors appointment and with what is proposed now with out realistic management for all is abominable, no thought of how our village can cope with this distraction of our way of life.

Education will not be available to all children as there are no places for them as no extra schools are being built this again is unacceptable the impact of the population is not possible as no thought has gone into the extra land available for the infrastructure it is madness to continue in this unthought out plan. Colchester will spread making us an urban jungle.

This can not be allowed to continue with no thought on how people can survive with out adequate hospitals doctors schools etc this cannot be allowed to go on without some sensible input and constructive thinking ,councillors can not just do as they please forgetting the people that have paid their taxes supported the councils all these years to be brushed aside.
This is insane thinking without a proper constructive plan to help all without out destroying our way of life.
Government have no idea as to what they want regarding more homes no thought about quality of life. It will cause over crowding and no infrastructure to cope with the rise in the populous. The health of the area will become impossible with no health care available as there will be no capacity in the one hospital that is suppose to serve all.

A percentage of social housing and housing for rent.

No social housing. Affordable housing is at present not affordable for people on lower incomes.

The plan is too vague and has not addressed issues raised by groups and individual members of the public.

I oppose the building of the Garden Village on the Colchester / Tendering borders on the grounds listed below.
1. Infrastructure
2. Water Treatment
3. Salary Brook boundary
4. Rapid Transport System
5. Housing
6. Gypsy / Traveller site

1) Concerns have been raised that no infrastructure being in place during the first stages of the development. There is not enough social, health or education provision initially planned. The report says these views have been taken on board but the consultation document does not address the concerns raised in any depth.
Within the Community and Social infrastructure assets at the earliest stage of development, (for each development) there should be essential requirements for:
* Early years and nursery provision
*Primary school(s)
*Secondary school
*Dentist, GP surgery, Pharmacy and clinical facilities offering out-patient support that cannot be provisioned at Colchester General Hospital
*A Community multi-use building with sufficient self-contained spaces within it to accommodate use by different faith groups, clubs and societies, including youth clubs
The suggestion that an initial 100+ houses may be required to begin funding the project before any infrastructure begins is alarming and directly in contradiction to the local plan.

2) There is a gap in terms of lacking a policy on grey and black water treatment specifically. This being of particular concern because of the odour emitted from the sewage works by The Hythe.
The problems of water and air pollution for the local residents of Elmstead and Crockleford Heath caused by the building of up to 9,000 accommodation units. There is the importance of identifying the means and method for the treatment of these waste water types at DPD stage, so they can be properly costed and prepared in advance before the commencement of any building.
Currently any policy as to how sewage and water will be dealt with is missing; in view of the final size of the garden community development, surely there is a vital need to deal with this essential part of the infrastructure right at the start.
There is the problem of major road disruption, in an already heavily traffic congested area, for the whole of the East of Colchester during the pipe-work installation to link to at the groundwork stage.

3) In the area of the suggested Knowledge Gateway / Industrial expansion, there is a concern that the proposed development could end up spilling halfway down the Salary Brook slopes designated as country park area, which is at best a meagre offering of habitat for the size of the area to be desecrated. This would be a contradiction of two other agreed principles based on community and public input into the engagement process.
Building on the ridgeline would cause buildings, not in character with a country park, to dominate these slopes and the whole surrounding landscape. The buildings would have a detrimental effect and be viewable from great distances, ie The University Towers.

4) The description of the route of the Rapid Transit System (RTS) connecting the Garden Community with the rest of Colchester is too vague in stating “it will be in place to connect the Garden Community with the University of Essex, Colchester Town Centre, Colchester Railway Stations, Colchester Hospital, Community Stadium, Colchester Sports Park and the existing Park and Ride site in north Colchester”. Prospectively, the buses will always be in traffic struggling through bottlenecks at railway and river crossings from the East of Colchester right into the town. In the documents, there are no plans to address these points by building new bridges or underpasses.
There is no current map provided to indicate the exact route, therefore leaving the developers open opportunity to place the road at their discretion. We need a clear definition of the route and identification of the bottlenecks and costings for resolving them. There is no current indication of how the RTS will actually be paid for; except for the developer stating a (non binding) certain amount of houses will have to be sold first, to allow for the building of the RTS.
The RTS will be built in stages according to the sale of properties to fund each part. This means years of increased traffic, starting with Heavy Goods Vehicles, leading onto trade vans and domestic cars passing through the village of Elmstead and the adjoining back-roads for many years.
5) Affordable Housing Phasing: The public should have a definitive statement stipulating that the 30% affordable housing rule should apply at all stages of the development. Planning permission stage, housing starts and housing occupation. Otherwise the developers would use an “Affordable Housing Phasing Strategy” to justify the late delivery, or diminished quantity of affordable housing.
Accordingly, all ‘Affordable Housing’ should be first offered to locally living residents affected by the development; followed by Front line / Blue Light workers.
6) Within the guidelines of Gypsy and Traveller needs: the size of the gypsy and traveller provision is to be determined as part of Gypsy and Traveller Needs Assessment.
How are the developers and council going to deal with this issue?
Where is this site to be placed as it has not been shown in the context of the planners outline permission. The site needed would be very big in relation to the GC; and at what stage would this ‘mini development’ take place.

Compliance:
I consider that the Development Plan Document is Legally compliant.
It is not sound for the reasons stated below.
I consider that the document complies with the statutory duty to co-operate, but the consultation process using the engagement website is overly complex and biased. It seems likely that many people will have been deterred from participation in the consultation by these arrangements.

I would be pleased to participate in the oral part of the examination if this would be of assistance.

GC Policy 1: Land Use and Spatial Approach.

• The Garden Community Principles unproven. The GC vision overly aspirational and adopts a naive perception of the way in which communities are established and of human behaviour. The latter is not simply determined by environment.
• The GC is unlikely to address a local housing need, unless a greater proportion of rented housing is included. The present proposed approach will encourage further migration from the London suburbs, by the property wealthy whose pattern of work has changed post Covid-19.
• Many prospective residents of the GC will not be seeking local jobs, they will be occasionally commuting to London and working from home.
• Unrealistic assumptions are made in relation to the extent to which private car usage will be reduced by the RTS and other more sustainable transport initiatives.
• The practicalities of community ownership are unclear.
• Shared ownership and rented housing should be included in the DPD as separate categories and the possibility of transferring from rent to shared ownership should be included.
• I was told at a consultation event that environmental requirements for new homes cannot exceed current building regulations, this is not clear from the DPD, which suggests the environmental requirements will be much higher.
• The neighbourhood map does not clearly distinguish between the North and Crockleford neighbourhoods.
• The development of the TCBGC does not justify the concreting over of a large part of rural northeast Essex.
• It does not seem logical that two proposed garden communities in north Essex were not considered to be viable, while the TCBGC is considered viable.

Policies Map:

• The need for 7,500 new homes in north Essex is not clearly established.
• A development on the Bromley Road has recently been curtailed because the developer’s expectation of potential sales has been reduced. Properties have also been sold to a London Borough to house homeless families.
• 1,000 to 1,500 new homes on Crockleford Heath will adversely impact on the special character of the area.
• The need for Knowledge Based Employment Land is not established, many the existing units at the University for Knowledge Based Employment remain vacant.
• The need for provision for Gypsies and Travellers is not supported by evidence.
• The term Green Links is not clearly defined. Are these for wildlife or walkers and cyclists? How wide are these corridors? A minimum of 100m may be appropriate.
• While Wivenhoe and Elmstead are provided with Strategic Green Gaps, why is no Green Gap provided for Crockleford Heath to preserve the special character of the area?
• The present proposals suggest that housing development to the south of the Bromley Road will encroach on Crockleford Heath. A Green Gap of at least 100m may be appropriate. Alternatively, given the high volume of traffic it may be appropriate not to develop any housing to the immediate south of the Bromley Road.

Policy 2: Nature.

• Nature and biodiversity are likely to be enhanced if housing development does not proceed.
• It is not clear how the safety of public spaces will be assured, and anti-social behaviour managed.
• Churn Wood is shown on the Framework Plan, but it is not made clear this is privately owned and does not have public access.
• What is an edible walkway – a licence to steal apples?
• How will community gardens be managed and maintained? If this is not clear these areas could become a focus for anti-social behaviour.
• This chapter of the DPD demonstrates an idealised and unrealistic approach to the relationship between people and nature. Many of the prospective residents of the GC may have little experience and knowledge of nature and little desire to develop such knowledge.

Policy 3: Place Shaping Principles.

• This chapter is commendable, but highly aspirational. It is not clear how quality of life, livability, equitable prosperity, and social cohesion are to be achieved in practice.
• Communities are not created by distinctive buildings. It is difficult to envisage that the TCBGC will not simply be another large housing development.
• There is a limit to which environment can have a positive impact on societal behaviour and crime can be designed out. Crime is a variable feature of human behaviour. It also reflects the quality and level of policing and other factors.

Policy 4: Meeting Housing Needs.

• There has been significant housing development around Colchester in recent years. Predominantly this has not met a local housing need, but has fuelled movement of people from other areas, particularly London It is difficult to imagine that if it proceeds the TCBGC will not have a similar pattern of home ownership.
• Residents on low income are likely to seek rented housing, from a provider of social housing and in this respect the chosen developer may be well placed to meet this need.
• To conflate shared ownership and rented housing in 30% figure for affordable housing is misleading. A greater proportion of rented housing may be necessary to meet local need.




Policy 5: Economic Activity and Employment.

• The objective of achieving one job per household in or near the garden community may be ambitious and will be dependent on factors such as the overall economic picture.
• It seems likely that a significant proportion of prospective residents will be employed in London and working remotely from home some of the time.

Policy 6: Community and Social Infrastructure.

• This section of the DPD is highly aspirational. Dependent upon the level of stewardship and management, what may emerge in practice could be very different.
• It is not clear whether multifunctional community buildings include the provision of healthcare services. This may be difficult to achieve in practice, given specialist medical needs.
• Management and longer-term stewardship of community provision of this nature could be clearer in DPD.

Policy 7: Movement and Connections.

• This policy section assumes that residents of the GC will adopt significantly reduced use of personal private cars. This may not be a realistic assumption.
• Similarly, neighbourhood delivery hubs will not be viable if residents choose to do their shopping outside of the neighbourhood centres by car in local supermarkets.
• The RTS will be operating on roads into Colchester City and will be subject to the same traffic delays as exist currently.

Policy 8: Sustainable Infrastructure.

• This policy is commendable but does not seem to be reflected in in the design requirements for buildings in the GC.

Just scrap it! There are a lot of houses in this region that are not selling so why build more!!

7500 homes is way to many! The roads around this area are far too busy as it is. This area is beautiful and will just be spoilt. Greedy builders charging extortionate prices and way out of reach for many. This will also create a lot of disruption to the surrounding villages. Please stop spoiling our countryside!

Response to updated plans - proposed development Tendring Garden Community

To whom It may concern,

When the original online consultations were proposed, I took part. I filled in the questionnaires, I watched and waited.

Now it appears, the final consultations are upon us - and as expected, the residents of Elmstead have seen their objections to this development ignored or overridden.

Firstly, the plans for the new road between the A133 and the A120 seem to have elther been forgotten, or now stand to be delayed until the first phase of building (at the Elmstead end naturally) is complete. We already deal with constant delays throughout the day on the A133 at Clingoe Hill, and on the Hythe in Colchester. Adding 7500 new homes without an additional road to take some of the burden is madness, and we have already seen results of this sort of bad planning around the areas of North Station and the northern approach - both of which can easily become unusable at certain times of the day.

There have been proposals for new rail and bus links to take the extra load, but nothing concrete - and let us be honest, in a time of cost cutting (which we have already seen In these plans) it is unlikely we will ever seen these links come to fruition. All of which will add additional load to the traffic system which is already creaking at the seams. Let us not forget the planned reduction In parking spaces in the garden community (to allow even more housing) which will lead to cars being parked on green areas and pavements. Those cars WILL be there, because the residents of the garden community WILL need them as all the places they will need to go will be on the outskirts of Colchester - because Colchester City Centre is dying, and all the shops and services you really NEED are relocating to the outskirts.

All of this will lead to a severe Impact on air quality in the general area - and both the residents of Elmstead AND the garden community will suffer for lt.

If (as expected) the first wave of building goes ahead at the Elmstead end, what happens to the local community services? Yes, we know that the proposal says there will be new schools, shops and a surgery, but these will not be in place straight away - if at all. Elmstead has one small general shop and a garage shop, and that is it. It has one Surgery which is already stretched, and one primary school - all of which will struggle to cope with an increase of the population, which is already occurring in other areas being developed around Elmstead.

It is Interesting that Tendring is proposing this garden community at the furthest point on Its borders, where it knows that most of the impact will be taken up by Colchester/Elmstead and Wivenhoe, Tendring says it has an obligation to provide homes for its community, but none of these homes will be in the reach of the average community buyers as they'll be priced too high (just look at the new housing estates off the Cowdrey Avenue in Colchester), so most of the buyers will be either private landlords or people from outside the community where wages are higher. Guess what, the population expands, rather than relocates.

By the way - Garden Community? Are you serious? This is going to be a high-density housing estate, poorly designed and poorly executed. Whoever the planners/designers/authorisers are, they obviously will not be living there - if they were, it would not even be considered.

Oh, and let us not even get started on the idea of Industrial parks located 1/2 a mile from Elmstead Church, near the A120 - with no link road. Where will their traffic go - oh the A133 again. Oh dear.

It all adds up to a poorly thought out, poorly planned and poorly executed proposal. The most annoying this about it is that whatever objections are raised, we will be told "there's no alternative" and it will go ahead - and ruin this area. I am writing this because I want my objections on record, because in the long run, It's the only option I have available to me. No-one at Tendring will listen, and no one cares - because at the end of the day It does not really affect them.

I really hope that my concerns never happen - because if they do, both the residents of Elmstead and the proposed residents of the Garden Community will suffer.

One last thing. Just how difficult is it to raise concerns on this project? I am sending this via post because the design on your online portal is biased and flawed. It's designed in such a way to make inputting any comments difficult (unless you're moderately computer savvy - I'm a computer programmer, and the experience was frustrating to say the least, god knows how anyone else manages to make comments), and actually getting into the portal requires registering using a poorly designed registration screen where it's easy to hit the wrong button, I suggest your web developers attend some web interface design courses where you learn to make sites usable, not just pretty.

I hope that those responsible for this development will make sure it is majority affordable homes, with access to green spaces which create biodiversity.

Very important that affordable housing ambitions are met and the need locally, particularly for lost cost rental properties, is met.

Drastically reduced and a more realistic approach is needed.

As previously mentioned this colossal new town needs further consideration. I appreciate the need for new housing, but realistically without concrete evidence to support the sustainability of this project it should be disbanded. There is no point in building thousands of homes with the ‘promise’ of schools, doctors etc. we all know that recruitment in these professions are limited at best. There is no strong evidence to state that these vacancies would be filled on such a humongous scale. We would then have a community with no facilities necessary for sustainable living.

Please see Elmstead Parish Council official response submission document submitted to TCB Garden Community
at tcbgardencommunity@colchester.gov.uk.

Please see Elmstead Parish Council official response submission document submitted to TCB Garden Community
at tcbgardencommunity@colchester.gov.uk.

A phase 1 appraisal is needed to show how the plan can be delivered over the next 10 years, and to identify any compromises needed and resultant changes to the plan.

Policy GC4: Meeting housing needs
Social housing: Part B requires 30% social housing, but the viability evidence presented suggests that it isn’t achievable, especially when up to date house prices, build costs and interest rates are used (see appendix 2 to my report).

Precedent sites at Alconbury and Welborne (Fareham) achieved 12.5% and 10% respectively in their early phases (see appendix 7 to my report).

The compromises needed should be identified and incorporated within the plan as per the Viability PPG, otherwise it cannot be found sound. The Viability PPG makes it clear that viability issues should be resolved at plan making stage, not left to the planning applications.

Further agreement is needed between Colchester and Tendring if their Duty to Co-operate is to be fulfilled. The present memorandum of understanding on equal social housing nomination rights expires at the end of the Section 1 plan period and needs to be extended in perpetuity.

Find a true place for such a project that size. Not build it in a countryside using fields grade 1 and destroying so many assets of the community. (ancient hedgerows, woodland, trees, a hamlet that is a natural place of beauty, protected lane, a grove, fauna and flora living in this area). Replacing it by a system that will need years to prove its effectiveness when we have a fully integrated and functional ecosystem in place is pure folly in my opinion.

The density is not proportionate for the area and the desire to build multi storey buildings is in disaccord with the local design of the Parish. The business park will have a negative impact on a listed building (Church and cemetery) and damage to architectural value of listed grade 1 Church. This site is an over development, that has not been thought through at all. It is an excessive bulk of a big number of houses making it a high density. The area of search established for the project (2017) for the local plan defined a broad range of housing provision between 7000 – 9000 dwellings. It should be noted this is substantially less than the combined housing requirement of 29,400 dwellings for Colchester and Tendring as established in policy 4 of the shared strategic plan, which is only for the period until 2033. A significant majority of these houses must still be placed on the edges of existing towns and villages, bringing the project’s justification into question. While somewhat arbitrary the project’s housing provision range of seven to nine thousand dwellings was only a starting point, intended to develop as evidence was gathered and planning commenced, but this was not told by our representatives. The area of search represents approximately 740 hectares of land. The settlement development boundary proposed in a draft DPD (2022) reduced this area as needed by the link road (A133 to A120) allocation, protection of ancient woodland and dedicated strategic green gaps, and some other smaller necessary concessions, a woodland remains within this settlement development boundary, and this is a real concern as it reduces immensely the developable area of land to place those houses. After the 2022 draft DPD was published, further concessions were made to expand areas dedicated to Salary Brook country park as well as Knowledge Gateway (university) for additional sporting facilities. This has therefore reduced the land for housing development quite considerately. Add to this the development for businesses and keeping in mind the significant number of existing residential properties within the area, which are rural homes with considerable gardens and other outdoor spaces, the land they are going to develop the project on is very small, therefore will push either to a high density development or to very high storey houses, and these facts will be in serious contrast with the character of the surrounding communities . Many of these homes in the Crockleford Heath are area of special character which is recognised (policy 1B) as requiring a substantially lower housing density than the rest of the area. These combined effects further reduce the available developable land allocation. I am not aware that there is a mention of all the real facts that make the developable land so small, or the quantity of land allocated for the development of those houses in the DPD or its evidence base. Their commitment to retain existing trees and hedgerows is wonderful, but I do not think that they will keep it. I believe that this brings further pressures on land use when we take into consideration town planning. Combining this policy, with the necessary allocation for school land of the 6 schools proposed in chapter 5 this continues to reduce the land that can be developed residentially and makes it harder to deliver satisfactorily and efficiently.

See attached letter for full text

Part H Student Accommodation

The University of Essex has long term plans to expand student numbers and to extend its accommodation provision. Accommodation for students in their first year of study and other priority groups will be provided on land identified for University Expansion within the Proposals Map. Other student accommodation will be encouraged in accessible locations within the ‘South Neighbourhood’ where it would have good sustainable links to the University of Essex and where it will contribute to a mixed and diverse community. The size and specification of any student accommodation outside of the expanded Campus will be determined through the Housing Strategy (see Part B) and will be informed by evidence held by the Councils in partnership with the University of Essex.

Please see attachment for full submission