SAVE LITTLE CHALFONT!

Bucks Council has this week notified residents that the developer has added some new documents to its planning application.

We are currently working our way through them and will let you know whether any action is needed, as soon as we finish this process – watch this space…

A developer has submitted an Outline Planning Application to Buckinghamshire Council under planning reference number PL/21/4632/OA.

A large number of documents accompany the application, these are being reviewed by the Parish Council and Community Association’s Coordination Group. A guidance leaflet on responding is being prepared for delivery around the village between 28 and 30 December.

For further information, please click here.

If you have received a leaflet from a company planning to build in Little Chalfont’s Green Belt on the former golf course and Homestead Farm, please click here to see our views and advice.

We are aware of the leaflet being posted through local doors this week and are considering what advice we should give.

In the meantime, we suggest you do nothing (which may well turn out to be our advice!).

There is currently no proposal by Buckinghamshire Council, our planning authority, to change Green Belt boundaries, and our position strongly opposing the release of Little Chalfont’s Green Belt for development is unchanged.

Please keep an eye on this site for further updates from the Coordination Group.

At its meeting on 21 October Buckinghamshire Council agreed to the proposal that the local plan, published by the two former district councils, should be withdrawn. It is now intended to be replaced by a new Buckinghamshire Development Plan, which it is hoped could be in place before the end of 2024.

The reasons for this decision, and an analysis of its consequences, are in the report prepared for Buckinghamshire Council’s meeting, a PDF of which is available from the post below.

It is too early to say whether the prospect of a revised plan is potentially helpful to our aim to preserve Little Chalfont’s local green belt site (SP BP6) from development. In the interval before a new plan appears, there is a danger that some opportunistic developers might submit applications to develop sites which the now withdrawn local plan proposed to release from the Green Belt.

We would expect Buckinghamshire Council’s Planning Officers generally to refuse such developments, but developers would then probably appeal against such refusal. The outcome would then depend on the decision of an Appeal Inspector and we can only hope for Inspectors’ decisions which uphold the national planning policy to safeguard land from inappropriate or major development within the Green Belt or an Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty. The fact that Buckinghamshire Council is already progressing its own Development Plan could also be a favourable consideration for refusal.

The Coordination Group of the Little Chalfont Parish Council and the Little Chalfont Community Association will continue to monitor all relevant future policy statements, actions and expected legislative changes, and circulate updates and further advice to the community, as and when appropriate.

Little Chalfont Coordination Group                                                    22 October 2020

At its meeting on 21 October Buckinghamshire Council will consider a proposal that the local plan published by the two former district councils should be withdrawn, and replaced by material in the new Buckinghamshire Local Plan, which it is hoped to produce by 2024.

The reasons for this proposal, and an analysis of the consequences, are in the attached report (PDF) prepared for Buckinghamshire Council’s meeting by the council officers.

Once a decision is taken, the coordination group of the parish council and the community association will consider the consequences for our campaign to protect Little Chalfont’s Green Belt land threatened by development, and prepare advice for the community.

From recent enquiries it would seem that resolving the Duty to Cooperate matter, covered in the news item below on 15 May, could still be some weeks or even months away. Buckinghamshire Council (the council) has still not submitted its full response to the Examination in Public (EiP) inspectors and there is no indication of when this will take place.

The remainder of the EiP cannot proceed until this issue has been decided and a request from the council for this to be dealt with at a hearing session (as opposed to a virtual meeting), has been agreed by the Inspectors. When such gatherings will again be permitted under the covid-19 pandemic is unknown and could well delay matters further.

Although the Local Plan for Three Rivers District Council has not yet been adopted, developers have submitted two applications for the development of land east of Green Street, one for 800 houses and an alternative for 300. The deadline for objections was 1 August.

The additional traffic on the A404 from either of these applications, if approved, would seriously increase traffic flows through Little Chalfont, and would exacerbate already very difficult queuing problems at Dog Kennel Lane and the approach to the M25.

A transcript of the Parish Council’s objection is available to read from the Key Documents tab of this website.

Although the Examination in Public has still to be re-arranged, the Planning Inspectors have reviewed the Council’s Duty to Co-operate with other local authorities when preparing the draft Local Plan. The Inspectors have written to Buckinghamshire Council to advise that it is their conclusion that the procedures required in regard to the Duty to Co-operate with Slough Borough Council have not been correctly followed. Unless the Council can demonstrate otherwise, the Inspectors cannot consider the Local Plan to be compliant and there is a strong likelihood that the Council will have to withdraw it.

A copy of the Inspectors’ letter to the council can be found here.

A copy of the Council’s initial response can be found here.

We will continue to update our site to keep you informed of new developments…