West Northamptonshire Local Plan – Responses to Regulation 18 – Message from Barby & Onley Parish Council

 Please see attached notification of upcoming work on Barby Lane

If you do not want to see at least 58 new homes being built around Barby over the next 15 years and you would like to see greater protection being given to the Rainsbrook Valley to prevent our surrounding Countryside from being developed, please respond to West Northamptonshire Council’s Local Plan consultation (www.westnorthants.gov.uk/local-plan)

You will need to complete the form and email it, by 27th March, to planningpolicyconsultation@westnorthants.gov.uk

https://cms.westnorthants.gov.uk/media/28146/download 

You may also like to mention that you would like to see Barby Lane, the main arterial route, in and out of Barby, being refurbished as a matter or urgency.

Residents may wish to include some of the following points in their objection

Object to Policy R2 – 58 new Homes to be built in Barby as part of the Rural Housing Allocation

• The allocation would need to be built outside the village boundary, destroying some of the countryside that surrounds the village. This is contrary to the Spatial Policy S1 ‘to protect the distinctive character & quality of rural settlements’
• The number of 58 new homes in Barby comes from a nonsensical calculation which unfairly includes a % of all the houses in Onley as well as Barby and surrounding areas.
• Barby should not be given an additional housing allocation by West Northants Council as there is already a housing allocation within our own Neighbourhood Plan (NDP) which was only made last year. This NDP housing allocation is currently going through planning application.
• There are numerous alternative brownfield & urban sites available within West Northamptonshire for building new homes rather than ruining the character and setting of Barby.
• It is undemocratic that residents had not been consulted previously on this imposed housing allocation. Greater Protection for the Rainsbrook Valley needs to be included in West Northants Local Plan
• Rugby Borough Council are proposing to provide protection to most of the Warwickshire section of the Rainsbrook Valley within their Local Plan (in their policy EN3).
• West Northants Council should provide the same protection for the part of the Valley that falls within Northamptonshire.
• West Northants landscape policy BN5 is not sufficient in providing adequate protection for the Valley and as, like Rugby have done, West Northants should include a dedicated policy to categorise the Rainsbrook Valley as a Landscape of Elevated Sensitivity
• Rugby’s landscape report (undertaken by a Company called Node) concluded that the Valley ‘should be understood and evaluated as a coherent landscape system’. Hence there should be a common understanding and designation of the Valley as a ‘Landscape of Elevated Sensitivity’ in its’ entirety irrespective of County boundary. The complete refurbishment of Barby Lane, Barby needs to be included in Section 14.6 as part of West Northants ‘Future Transport Solutions’ with their Local Plan
• Barby Lane, the main northern arterial road in and out of Barby, is totally unfit for purpose and needs to be totally refurbished.
• • The road was originally designed to handle only very light residential traffic and not the capacity of traffic that has been using it now for many years