Draft Black Country Plan

Support

Representation ID: 21200

Received: 11/10/2021

Respondent: Taylor Wimpey

Agent: Avison Young

Representations of Taylor Wimpey – Land at Barns Lane, Walsall
Avison Young (‘AY’) is instructed by Taylor Wimpey Strategic Land (‘Taylor Wimpey’) to prepare and submit representations to the Draft Black Country Plan (Regulation 18) consultation (‘Draft Plan Consultation’). Taylor Wimpey controls land at Barns Lane, Aldridge (‘the site’), edged red on the Site Location Plan attached to these representations at Appendix I.

Taylor Wimpey has reviewed the Black Country Authorities’ (‘BCAs’) consultation document and wishes to make representations on it. This letter should, therefore, be taken as Taylor Wimpey’s comprehensive response to the consultation. It should be read alongside the completed response form that we have provided as part of the representations.

In particular, our Client welcomes the Draft Plan’s recognition that the site can, and should, deliver a development that is capable of materially contributing to Walsall’s, and the Black Country’s housing requirements. In this respect, Policy HOU1 (site ref. WAH251) allocates the site for 112 dwellings.

Notwithstanding the support for the site’s allocation, these representations made by Taylor Wimpey make a number of observations on the policies contained within the Draft Plan and the emerging evidence base that underpins the draft policies and allocations contained in the Plan.

With these introductory points in mind, the remainder of our submission goes on to:
• describe our Client’s site and the merits of it as a development opportunity;
• provide our Client’s response to the Draft Plan consultation; and
• summarise the key points arising and overarching conclusions.

We address each of the above in turn.
Taylor Wimpey’s Land at Barns Lane
The site extends to 4.3 hectares (ha) and is located on the western edge of Aldridge, along Barns Lane. It consists primarily of arable farmland and associated buildings. To the south and southwestern edges of the site, the site is bound by existing residential dwellings along Barns Lane. To the north east lies a lake known locally as The Swag, along with Aldridge Sailing Club. To the northwest, the site is bound by Barns Lane Pool and Nature Reserve.

The site is positioned in a highly sustainable location, approximately 1.5 miles (2.4km) north west of the centre of Aldridge and 1.2 miles (1.9km) south of the centre of Shelfield, both of which contain a range of facilities and employment opportunities. Bus stops are located directly opposite the site along Barns Lane and are served by routes 35 and 35A, which provide frequent services to Walsall, Lichfield and Castlefort.

Taylor Wimpey is in the process of appointing a team of technical consultants and masterplanners to carry out various surveys and investigations and use these to comment on the development potential of the site. The findings will be published in a Development Statement and will be submitted to Planning Officers at Walsall Council in due course, who have agreed to accept the submission of additional supporting information after the Draft Black Country Plan consultation deadline. Nevertheless, Taylor Wimpey has, for the purposes of demonstrating the deliverability of the site, prepared an Illustrative Masterplan (attached to these representations at Appendix II), which demonstrates that the site is capable of accommodation approximately 130 dwellings at a density of 35 dwellings per ha. This is subject to further technical investigation.

Housing Allocations

In order for the Draft Plan to be sound it must provide a clear strategy for bringing sufficient land forward, and at a sufficient rate, to address objectively assessed needs over the Plan period. Because the BCAs must also identify and update annually a supply of specific deliverable sites sufficient to provide a minimum of five years’ worth of housing against its housing requirement, the Draft Plan is also required to identify specific, deliverable sites for years one to five of the plan period and then sufficient developable sites, or broad areas of growth, for the remainder of the plan period.

The Glossary to the NPPF defines ‘deliverable’ sites as being available now, offering a suitable location for development. In order for a site to be considered ‘developable’ it should be in a suitable location for housing development with a reasonable prospect that it will be available and could be viably developed at the point envisaged.

Our Client welcomes the Draft Plan’s recognition that the site can, and should, deliver a development that is capable of materially contributing to Walsall, and the Black Country’s housing requirements. The site is available, offers a suitable location for development and is achievable with a realistic prospect of delivering housing within the first five years of the plan period.

Object

Representation ID: 21201

Received: 11/10/2021

Respondent: Taylor Wimpey

Agent: Avison Young

Policy CSP1 – Development Strategy
Following the publication of the revised Standard Methodology for calculating housing need in December, which included an urban uplift of 35% applicable to the 20 largest cities and urban areas, the BCAs have calculated that their combined local housing need for the Plan period is 76,076 homes.
Policy CSP1 goes on to set out how the BCAs will go about meeting this need. It says that it expects the Plan’s housing allocations to deliver some 47,837 dwellings, based on the following components (see Table 1 overleaf):

Table 1: Black Country Development Strategy 2020-2039
Location Housing (net new homes)
Strategic Centre 9,561
Core Regeneration Areas 11,208
Neighbourhood Growth Areas 6,792
Towns and Neighbourhoods Areas 12,625
Small windfall housing sites (outside Strategic Centres) 7,651
Total Black Country 47,837
To be exported through Duty to Co-operate 28,239
Grand Total 76,076

Evidently, even if the Council’s planned supply delivers in the way anticipated in the Draft Plan, the BCAs will under-deliver against their local housing need within their administrative boundaries by 28,239 dwellings.

However, in reality, the shortfall is probably even greater. We say this because the Plan, as drafted, does not propose to accommodate any additional homes to help address the unmet need arising from Birmingham and elsewhere in the wider housing market area.

As outlined in Table 1, the Plan proposes to export over 28,000 dwellings to neighbouring authorities through the Duty to Co-operate. The Duty to Co-operate Statement, published by the BCAs as part of the Draft Plan evidence base, concludes that neighbouring authorities can potentially accommodate up to 14,750 homes, as follows:
• Cannock Chase – Between 500 and 2,500 homes;
• Lichfield – Between 2,000 to meet Black Country needs out of a contribution of 2,665 to the Greater Birmingham and Black Country Housing Market Area (GBBCHMA) as a whole;
• South Staffordshire – Up to 4,000 homes;
• Shropshire – 1,500 homes.
• Stafford – Up to 2,000 homes
• Solihull – A proportion of the 2,105 dwelling contribution identified in the submitted Local Plan to the GBBCHMA
• Telford and Wrekin – 3,700 homes.

Whilst the above contributions are to be tested as the Local Plans for some neighbouring authorities are progressed (namely Cannock Chase, Lichfield, South Staffordshire, Shropshire and Solihull), there is certainly no guarantee that these additional dwellings will come forward to address the shortfall currently faced by the BCAs. This is evident in the case of Solihull who were expected to allocate a proportion of their 2,105 dwelling contribution identified in its submitted Local Plan to the Black Country. However, Solihull MBC’s view expressed at the Examination of its new Local Plan is that it will now no longer plan to take any unmet need from the Black Country up to and post 2031 and will, instead, look to exclusively assist in meeting the unmet needs of Birmingham.

Moreover, the Duty to Co-operate Statement suggests that the level of housing that Stafford Borough and Telford and Wrekin are able to accommodate should be viewed as ‘minimums’, however, there is no evidence to suggest that this is the case, as the Draft Plan is not supported by any Statements of Common Ground, or other similar document, which commits these authorities to taking a proportion of the Black Country’s unmet housing needs.

In any event, if the BCA’s assumptions around how their unmet housing need will be distributed amongst the neighbouring local authorities are correct, this would still leave a shortfall of some 13,489 dwellings that will need to be allocated. This being the case, the BCAs are failing to plan to meet their identified need, contrary to the provisions of the NPPF. In order to address this, the BCAs must, in our view, look at allocating additional sites in the Plan to help meets the Black Country’s housing requirements over the Plan period.

Support

Representation ID: 21202

Received: 11/10/2021

Respondent: Taylor Wimpey

Agent: Avison Young

Policy GB1 – The Black Country Green Belt

In light of the above, it is inevitable that Green Belt land in the Black Country will need to be released to help the authorities meet their housing needs over the Plan period. It is evident that the BCAs have examined fully all other reasonable options for meeting their identified need for development and have concluded that they could not achieve this alone by adopting a strategy that accords with the criteria set out in paragraph 141 of the NPPF. In our view, this demonstrates that the exceptional circumstances do exist to justify the BCAs making changes to existing Green Belt boundaries.

We support the BCA’s acknowledgement that the site at Barns Lane is considered appropriate for the release from the Green Belt, as evidenced by Policy HOU1. Our Client’s site is well contained, with well defined, defensible boundaries on its western, southern and northern sides (i.e. Barns Lane to the south and east, and The Swag to the north).

Comment

Representation ID: 21203

Received: 11/10/2021

Respondent: Taylor Wimpey

Agent: Avison Young

Policy DEL1 – Infrastructure Provision

This policy requires that all new developments should be supported by the necessary on and offsite infrastructure to serve its needs, mitigate its impact on the environment and the local community and ensure that it is sustainable and contributes to the proper planning of the wider area, unless material circumstances or considerations indicate otherwise.

With respect to our Client’s site, we note that Policy WSA7 of the Draft Plan suggests that the development of the site could deliver “appropriate local facilities to support new residents and to enhance the sustainability of the existing area, including a new primary school and local health centre”.

In terms of any necessary infrastructure required in Aldridge or the wider Black Country, we note that paragraph 4.5 of the Draft Plan states that the Plan will be supported by an Infrastructure Delivery Plan, however we cannot locate this within the evidence base the BCA have published on the Black Country Plan website. We would be grateful to have sight of this document if it is publicly available, in order that we can review and comment on it.

Notwithstanding this position, the provision of developer contributions should only be sought where these are proportionate to the level and impact arising from new development. As outlined in paragraph 57 of the NPPF:
“Planning obligations must only be sought where they meet all of the following tests:
a) Necessary to make the development acceptable in planning terms;
b) Directly related to the development; and
c) Fairly and reasonably related in scale and kind to the development.”

Comment

Representation ID: 21204

Received: 11/10/2021

Respondent: Taylor Wimpey

Agent: Avison Young

Policy HOU2 – Housing Density, Type and Accessibility

Policy HOU2 recognises that the density and type of housing to be provided on any housing site will be informed by (i) sub-regional and local needs, (ii) access to sustainable transport methods and (iii) the need to achieve high quality design. Insofar as (i) is concerned, our Client considers it will be important to maintain flexibility to allow for changing local market circumstances. In this regard, it will also be important to ensure that housing mix prescriptions are determined in line with up-to-date evidence.

Paragraph 125 of the National Planning Policy Framework states:
“Where there is an existing or anticipated shortage of land for meeting identified housing needs, it is especially important that planning policies and decisions avoid homes being built at low densities and ensure that developments make optimal use of the potential of each site.”

This policy also states that plans should contain minimum density standards for city and town centres and other locations that are well served by public transport, and that the use of minimum density standards should also be considered for other parts of the plan area and that it may be appropriate to identify a ‘range’ of densities that reflects the accessibility and potential of different areas.

The Black Country is a highly constrained District, in terms of Green Belt boundaries and other constraints, and Taylor Wimpey therefore appreciates that available land will need to be used in the most efficient way to ensure that the BCAs are able to meet their future housing requirements. Taylor Wimpey, therefore, as a matter of principle, support the range of minimum net densities set out in Policy HOU2 of between 40 dph and 100 dph.

Notwithstanding this, high densities will not be appropriate in all proposed housing locations, for example in previously developed land within the Green Belt, or sites which are within close proximity to national designated sites i.e. SSSIs etc. Densities should therefore be considered on a site-by-site basis, taking into account local circumstances.

Part 5 of the policy also states that further details of design requirements for housing developments may be set out in Supplementary Planning Documents. If such a document is to be produced, it is essential that it is prepared in parallel with the BCP so that any cost implications can be properly viability tested in conjunction with other policy requirements to ensure that it will not have any detrimental impact upon scheme delivery.

Comment

Representation ID: 21205

Received: 11/10/2021

Respondent: Taylor Wimpey

Agent: Avison Young

Policy HOU3 – Delivering Affordable, Wheelchair Accessible and Self Build / Custom Build Housing

We note that this policy requires all developments of ten homes or more to provide a proportion of affordable housing, ranging from 10% to 30% depending on (i) if the site is located in a lower or higher value zone and (ii) if the site is greenfield or brownfield. The policy goes on to say that the tenure and type of affordable homes sought will be determined on a site-by-site basis, based on national planning policy and best available information regarding local housing needs, site surroundings and viability considerations.

Our Client supports the Draft Plan’s desire to see appropriate levels of affordable housing delivered in the Black Country, as well as it’s recognition that the tenure and type of affordable dwelling will vary according to market conditions. This is a critical factor which ensures sites are able to be delivered. However, it considers that it will be important to maintain the same type of flexibility when it comes to the proportion of affordable housing a development will be required to deliver, to allow for changing local market circumstances. It is recommended that this is reflected in the policy wording.

Comment

Representation ID: 21206

Received: 11/10/2021

Respondent: Taylor Wimpey

Agent: Avison Young

Policy TRAN8 – Planning for Low Emission Vehicles

This policy seeks to ensure that new developments include adequate provision for charging infrastructure e.g. electric vehicle charging points in car parks, measures to encourage LEV use through travel plans and other initiatives.

Our Client supports the provision of electric vehicle charging points in principle, but has significant concerns about the practicalities of delivery, in light of wider infrastructure constraints. The additional loading created by car charging infrastructure is significant and it is essential that the Black Country Authorities liaise with electricity providers as part of the Black Country Plan process so that the implications in terms of network capacity can be understood and planned for. It cannot be left to individual developers to pick up the cost of what could be multi-million-pound upgrades to the Black Country’s electricity infrastructure.

It will also be important for the policy wording to maintain some flexibility so that in cases where the provision of such infrastructure would make a scheme unviable, an exception can be made.

Support

Representation ID: 21207

Received: 11/10/2021

Respondent: Taylor Wimpey

Agent: Avison Young

Policy ENV3 – Nature Recovery Work and Biodiversity Net Gain

Our Client supports the principal of net gain and the 10% target which will shortly be mandated nationally. It also supports the principal of calculating net gain using the national Biodiversity Metric, assuming the Draft Plan is referring to the Biodiversity 3.0 metric provided by DEFRA, to ensure a consistency of approach between Local Authorities. The policy should be updated to make specific reference to this metric.

Object

Representation ID: 21208

Received: 11/10/2021

Respondent: Taylor Wimpey

Agent: Avison Young

Policy ENV4 – Provision, retention and protection of trees, woodlands and hedgerows

Whilst our Client recognises and supports the BCA’s aspirations to increase tree canopy cover across the Black Country, it expresses reservations around the obligations of Policy ENV4 in this regard, specifically parts 2 and 13 of this policy which require:
• a buffer around individual veteran or ancient trees likely to be impacted by development of a minimum of 15 times the diameter of the tree, approximately 5m from the edge of the tree’s canopy if that area is larger than 15 times its diameter; and
• new developments to make a minimum contribution of 20% canopy cover across the development site and a recommended contribution of 30% canopy cover across the development site.

We understand that these requirements stem from recommendations contained within the Emergency Tree Plan for the UK (2020), prepared by The Woodland Trust. We would note that, whilst useful, this piece of guidance is not statutory in nature, nor has it been produced for or by the Government. In such instances, it would be unrealistic to expect developments to adhere to such guidance. Moreover, by necessitating a ‘one size fits all approach’ for the contribution developments make to canopy cover, this part of the policy fails to take into account on-site conditions which could mean this cannot be achieved. Such conditions should not jeopardise future development across the Black Country, particularly in the context of such an acute need for housing and employment land. We therefore recommend that the policy wording be revised so that canopy cover is determined on a site-by-site basis.

Comment

Representation ID: 21209

Received: 11/10/2021

Respondent: Taylor Wimpey

Agent: Avison Young

Policy CC2 – Energy Infrastructure

Parts 1 to 3 of this policy require new developments of 10 homes or more to include opportunities for decentralised energy provision within the site, unless it can be demonstrated that the development is not suitable, feasible or viable for district heat or decentralised power networks. Where there is existing decentralised energy provision available close to the site, the development will be expected to link into it or should be designed to accommodate a subsequent connection.

Whilst Taylor Wimpey supports the principal of planning for development in ways which help, as much as possible, eliminate and mitigate greenhouse gas emissions, it has a number of concerns around the provisions of Policy CC2. Firstly, the assumption that developments can easily to offsite sources is problematic, as this may require connection through land outside of the ownership of the application and over which they have no control. As a result, it would be difficult to guarantee that such connections would be available to serve the site when required or that they would be available at all. In addition, the information provided in the BCP Viability Study suggests that the provision of or connection to decentralised energy networks has not been factored into the viability assessment work. The viability implications of such provision have not, therefore, been adequately assessed. The costs of provision or of connection to decentralised energy networks will need to be properly considered in the Council’s viability evidence if this is to be pursued.

Part 4 of the policy goes on to deal with proposals for on-site energy provision and the means by which this can be achieved. These provisions (parts a to j of the policy wording) are detailed, but not clearly justified and so seem somewhat over prescriptive. We would recommend that the policy wording be revised to encourage developers and energy companies / bodies to engage in the early stage of the development process to establish the likely future energy and infrastructure requirements, and to engage with the relevant BCP authorities to determine the most appropriate solution.