Object

Representation ID: 17277

Received: 10/10/2021

Respondent: Rebecca Neill

I am lodging my formal objection against Policy WSA9 strategic allocation WSA9 - the proposed development of the land to the East of Chester Rd, North of Pacific Garden Centre, Hardwick, Streetly. The proposed development is for 415 houses to be built on this site. I have the following points of objection:
1. This site falls on and close to greenbelt land. This is a direct contrevention of Walsall Council's development policy adopted in 2019 and published on the website which states that greenbelt will be protected and that building will not be permitted unless there are exceptional circumstances. In this case there are none. The development of green belt is also in contravention of the 'brown field first objective' of the Walsall site location document, section 2.1. There are ample brownfield sites in the Borough. I strongly object to this proposed development as the green belt forms an important component of the Borough's environmental network providing for the continued role of agriculture and maintaining a rural character. Once this land has gone, it can never be replaced. It will effect the character of the entire area. There appears to have been little thought to alternative sites, such as for example, the Town Centre, where office buildings could be repurposed for affordable housing which is where the housing need is most required. The average price of houses in this area is £1m. These are not the tenure of affordable houses.
2. The local infrastructure will be unable to cope with a significant rise in residents. The Chester Road is already extremely congested and the addition of hundreds of new residents and drivers will significantly increase this and the associated danger, as well as compromise air quality in the area. The impact on already overstretched community services (doctors, schools, etc.) would be huge.
3.