Land - for building on

At south cambs this evening for a meeting with parish councils.

SCDC needs to prepare a Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment (SHLAA) as part of the evidence base for the new South Cambridgeshire Development Plan. The SHLAA is a technical assessment that will identify sites that are potentially suitable for housing.

Click to take you to the maps of the land that has been put forward by developers and land-owners, and which was discussed in general terms.

Officers reckon a fraction of the land put forward will be needed to meet housing needs. Clearly housing round Cambridge is a good return on investment. Some of the land that was "Hanley Grange" is there again.

Process will take three years, with first step being a technical review of the land offered up - eg flood plains. Then public consultation in June next year, with decisions the following year.

Dale Farm - judge says council's enforcement plans too wide

Just been reading the judgment given by the judge hearing the arguments in the High Court about whether the Dale Farm evictions can go ahead. Basically he ruled that what Basildon Council intended to do by way of demolition (gates, walls etc) goes beyond what is set out in the enforcement notices served on the travellers between 2002 and 2004. The complexity is around the relationship between stuff built on the hard-standing that was the subject of the enforcement notices. Caravans are a different issue.

So a further hearing this week and maybe more detailed enforcement notices may have to be re-issued - who knows. As always, the devil is in the detail.

IWM Neighbourhood Forum 19 October

Continuing the vaguely militaristic series of recent posts, here is the original Ledo Road, the overland supply route linking India to China during WW II and after which Burma and Ledo Roads in Whittlesford are named.
I'm making sure that any issues from the residents of said B & L roads regarding the Imperial War Museum across the way from them are discussed in good time at the parish council and taken forward to the Neighbourhood meeting with the IWM director on October 19.

Red Lion at Whittlesford Bridge re-opens

Strange day last week - spent the morning doing some work with the Ministry of Defence in London (I'd tell you more but then I'd have to kill you). Then after full Council meeting in the afternoon and a session with planning agents till eight, rushed back to catch the last hour of the grand re-opening of the Red Lion Hotel at Whittlesford Bridge with their new reatuarant area, which looks pretty good, and we intend to check it out properly soon.
The guest of honour - keeping the links up between the Red Lion and the Imperial War Museum at Duxford - was Cpl Johnson Beharry VC, looking very cool and in control. You don't often get to shake hands with a man who has won the VC.
I know some people don't like the scale of the hotel that has been built on the site, but I've always taken the view that if the Red Lion didn't move forward it would have closed and been boarded up within a couple of years. And the district conservation team worked closely with the owners to blend the new with the historic buildings.

Whittlesford when global warming really kicks in ...

Seriously though, glad to see that in my absence on hols the parish council approved the proposals to put solar panels on the roof of the village hall.

This is the sort of community "green payback" initiative that the government's energy incentive schemes are supposed to encourage, so good that we are leading the way. Well done to the Memorial Hall Management Committee for doing the maths and putting together the bid.

The road even less well travelled....

The Dale Farm impasse continues, with the High Court looking to make a decision at the end of this week, a fortnight after the clearance of the unlawful bit of the traveller site in Basildon was due.

It is a very complex legal process, and an expensive one, and the consequences with regard to law on planning enforcement will be extensive.

So far, no reports of unlawful incursions onto Smithy Fen or elsewhere in South Cambs after a few initial reports. Police liaison being kept up and enforcement team also active in checking any likely places.

Burglary and an attempted break-in

Getting reports that a commercial premises in Whittlesford had an attempted but thankfully unsuccessful break-in over the week-end. Police in attendance.
Early in August a burglary took place at a house in Whittlesford while people were away, but the goods taken may have been recovered thanks to police action in raiding a premises in another village after a tip-off.
So check security, especially if late holidays planned, team up with neighbours to keep an eye on empty houses.
We will take up these developments with the local police squad at the early October Neighbourhood Forum  at Sawston.

War planes? You'd have thought they'd have brought their own

The F15s over Whittlesford this weekend are from the airshow - they fly over at three-ish today and tomorrow. Then they are not back for another five years. Makes the Spitfires that normally go over at this time of year seem like the drone of a passing bumble bee, but these jets do have a connection with Duxford, as this squadron evolved from the US air force based  there in 1941.

You have to be Geordie to get the joke.