The house building mania in and around Bridport continues. You might have thought with the Vearse Farm plan for 760 houses (which the local plan wants to raise to 930 houses) there would be a reticence from Dorset Council to approve yet more housing particularly on land designated as AONB (Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty). But further house building plans and work continues on many sites.

The reality is that we are seeing a progressive urbanisation of Bridport without the investment in or capacity for the necessary infrastructure. Bridport’s status as a small market town counts for nothing with the council seeing it as an easy and desirable place to meet their government imposed housing targets.

An application to build a single bungalow on a field adjoining Watton Lane and Broad Lane was approved in 2018. This field is AONB designated and forms part of the panoramic view from West Bay.

It does not matter to the council that Broad Lane is totally unsuitable (largely single track, no footpaths, no lighting etc) for more housing or that the occupants will have to be car users making a mockery of their climate emergency declaration and intention to only build houses in sustainable locations.

In 2019 a further application was made for 2 more houses. The planning committee for the reasons given were totally unimpressed and rejected the application by an 8 to 1 majority. However, an appeal was made by the land owner, Mr Norman, who was in the news recently when he was fined for multiple food hygiene breaches after his Bradpole based slaughterhouse was found to be significantly unclean.

Despite all the objections the planning inspector decided to grant the appeal and approve the planning application ignoring local democracy and the firm views of the councillors on the planning committee.

Now the saga continues with a further application to increase the number of houses to three – two of which are 4 bed houses covering a much larger area than in the original application.

It looks like there is a “salami” style process going on where new applications are made for increasing number of houses in the expectation that the planning committee/officers will find it difficult to refuse each successive increased application having approved the previous one. It should be noted that the site could potentially allow for 20+ dwellings!

The councils actions are scandalous – this application has been marked for delegated approval and will therefore not come before the planning committee preventing neighbours and other interested parties from presenting their objections in person. Also the notification of the application has not been sent to neighbours. It almost seems the council want to get this application through on the quite with the minimum of objections.

So much for just one bungalow in the corner of the field!

So what can you do? Please help to get this latest application properly considered and refused by:

Going on to the council planning website and putting in your objections. The link below takes you to the application (P/FUL/2021/01762) and you can click on the box at the bottom right of the page to make comments on the application. The deadline is 1 September so please be prompt.

https://planning.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk/plandisp.aspx?recno=236530

Emailing the following with a request that there is proper consultation with the application being discussed in public at a committee meeting. Just quote the application number in your email and say you object.

Mr Shortell,Chair of planning – cllrdavid.shortell@dorsetcouncil.gov.uk

Mr Pipe, Vice Chair – magpiebillpipe@freeuk.com

Mike Garrity Head of planning – mike.garrity@dorsetcouncil.gov.uk

A planning appication has been made for the construction of a pedestrian/cycle link between Pine View and the Vearse Farm development (granted outline planning permission in May 2019 under planning reference WD/D/17/000986).

This link is essential for providing a route from the development into the town without using the busy and dangerous West Road. There are however issues in relation to Pine View which is very congested with parked vehicles and through traffic avoiding the busy West Road into the town. Naturally there are concerns that introducing further pedestrian and cycle traffic into Pine View could make matters worse and increase risks to pedestrians, cyclist and mobility scooter users.

If you have any concerns or comments in relation to this planning application then please look at this application on the Dorset Council website (https://www.dorsetcouncil.gov.uk/planning-buildings-land/planning/planning-application-search-and-comment) using application number P/FUL/2021/01895.

You will then be able to add your coments and also look at comments lodged by others.

Members of the steering group held an on-line meeting with representatives from the developers of the Vearse Farm site. We were pleased that they had initiated contact with us as part of their community engagement.

Kathryn Pennington from Vistry Partnerships and David Matthews from Barratt David Wilson Homes are senior Directors in the South West. At the meeting we explained about the activities of ADVEARSE over the past 8 years and how our objectives as an organisation had developed as the situation moved on We reiterated that our reasons for opposing the scheme held good but that our approach was essentially constructive. We stressed that our current objectives were to ensure that Bridport should gain maximum benefit from whatever develops on the site.

We were able to ask questions about the Barratt / Vistry ( Thereafter B& V ) plans. We explored areas which are of most concern to us and those whom we represent. These included traffic and environmental issues. We stressed our expectation that the Dorset Council planning process should give sufficient time for consideration of the detailed plans . We welcomed the prospect of a website which will give local people information about the overall scheme and more detailed plans as they emerge. Despite the constraints of the ongoing pandemic Barratt and Vistry appear committed to consultation.

The following may be of interest

• B&V are working with Highways England on plans for the roundabout at Miles Cross .
• B&V are only providing the houses and school .The employment land and care home will be developed separately by the landowners.
• B&V said that they are committed to using a Fabric First approach which is recognised as best practice in terms of energy efficiency and building practices.
• Affordable housing – B&V are committed to providing the full amount per the S106 and hope to be able to exceed this amount up to a figure of approximately 40% of the total number.
• The detailed planning phase is expected to be completed and approved by end 2021 and work on VF infrastructure will commence in early 2022.
• B&V are willing to consider suggestions from local residents/groups for improvements in the detailed plans
• The additional 170 houses on VF in the current local plan which is out for consultation are not on land that B&V are building on.
• B&V have a sales name of Foundry Lea and consultation website of www.foundrylea.co.uk which will be going live shortly.

We found the representatives to be open and we have established the basis for ongoing discussions and communication. Please use the ADVEARSE website to alert us to any issues which you think should be raised. Both organisations are working with the Bridport Town Council and Symondsbury Parish Council. You may also raise any questions with them.

The Vearse Farm development represents the largest single development in Bridport’s history. It is important that the local community engages to ensure that it can benefit the whole town.

We have completed and submitted our comments on the Local Plan to Dorset Council.

The link to see the final comments is:

http://www.advearse.org.uk/wp-content/uploads/2021/03/ADVEARSE-response-to-Local-Plan-10-03-21.docx

Please make sure you send your comments in by the 15 March deadline!

We have been advised by a supporter that they experienced issues with accessing the Dorset Council website to make comments on the local plan.

The website was not working properly, in particular not saving submissions so people were losing work.

If you experience any issues when putting local plan comments on to the DC website then please advise us so we can make representations to DC. You can as we explained in our previous post email comments to DC.