Community web site for Little Dunmow and the surrounding area

"Officers are currently collating the submissions and preparing to analyse and further explore the issues raised.

Further work will be needed to inform decisions on Core Strategy Options before the Council approve an approach for submission to the Government. This will involve work on transport, housing trajectories, water cycles and other infrastructure issues, together with testing scenarios for growth, including options for the airport.

We will not be recommending a Core Strategy to the March Environment Committee. It is unlikely that we will be in a position to make a recommendation in 2008."

(A full unabbreviated version of this statement can be viewed on the home page of the UDC website.)

In the meantime, Sir Alan Haselhurst MP has held a meeting on the 13th March with representatives from each of the Uttlesford Parish Council’s.

Meeting points:

• UDC has to plan for an extra 4200 houses with the district between now and 2024.
• If UDC do not decide where to put the required 4200 homes within a given timeframe, then a developer could submit a planning application and the Government Inspector could call in the application and make a decision on it.
• Sir Alan indicated that there were basically two options of where to place the additional houses, namely;
  • A concentrated solution within a single development.
  • A distributed solution where every Parish took on some additional housing (a shared pain approach).
  
• The meeting had been set up by Sir Alan to gather all Parish representative views and to see if it was possible to allocate all the 4200 houses throughout the whole of the District, but acknowledging that this would impact on infra-structure costs.
• There are issues with access to and demand to be put on the West Anglia Railway line, roads and hospital beds due to the increase in population that would happen between now and 2024.
• A simplistic shared allocation of additional 4200 houses would be to allocate 80 to each individual Parish, however this would not be a sensible approach for the smallest Parishes with less than 50 houses in them, and also the towns would be unfairly advantaged.
• It is accepted that social housing is required in order to allow offspring of local families to remain within the area. All developments of over 15 houses are required to have 40% social housing.
• BAA recent planning application for the second runway infers that 13000 jobs will be created within the local area.
• The government is at present awaiting planning applications for over 50 Eco towns [5-10,000 houses] and will shortly decide on a short list of 3-4. There have been 4 applications to UDC for Eco towns.
• John Mitchell put up a list of each Parish within Uttlesford, comparing the number of houses per Parish in 2001 and 2007. Little Dunmow had by far the greatest percentage increase of 445%, growing from 125 to 682. Details of houses built per Parish between 2001 and 2007 can be viewed here.
• Sir Alan then asked each Parish representative how many additional houses they were prepared to accept such that all Parishes shared out the additional 4200 houses. First time round this totalled 1476, and on a second round 2171, well short of the 4200 required. It was stated that Little Dunmow would not be prepared to take any additional houses.

The following options are to be considered by UDC to try and meet the needs of providing 4200 houses within the local development framework:

1. Distributing houses throughout those Parishes that are prepared to accept additional housing. It was acknowledged that some villages want additional housing to ensure the ongoing viability of the local school, shops, post office and to provide affordable local housing etc. This could accommodate 2000+ houses. Plus creating 3-4 Oakwood Park size developments [600-800 houses] spread out around the District.
2. A single concentrated development of 3000-4200 houses, however this would then preclude individual villages getting the additional housing they might want.
3. 6-8 Oakwood Park size developments [600-800 houses] spread out around the District.
4. A show of hands was taken and 17 representatives wanted option 2, and 6 for option 3. No vote was taken on option 1.

Sir Alan closed the meeting thanking everyone for their input, and he asked John Mitchell to see if it was possible to try and accommodate the additional 4200 houses throughout the district based on a distributed solution, and it maybe that each Parish Council will receive a letter proposing that they accept a certain amount of houses. It was acknowledged that Little Dunmow had already contributed over its fair share between 2001-2007.