Rushcliffe Borough Council (RBC) has warned there could be less assurance that house building on a major site would be accompanied by key infrastructure and services – if a campaign group pursues a legal judicial review of a key planning document and lands taxpayers with a six-figure legal bill.
The Gamston/Tollerton site was put forwards for development by various landowners, including Nottinghamshire County Council (NCC), with planning applications submitted for part of the site and others expected shortly.
RBC has nationally set house building targets from the Government, and if these targets are not met, housing developers can appeal to the Government’s Planning Inspectors to ask for permission. It appealed to government to quash the targets in a Full Council motion last year which to date has not been accepted.
The Save Nottingham City Airfield group has lodged the review over the Council’s adoption of a supplementary planning document, known as an SPD, earlier this year that covers the former airfield site and wider area.
The SPD document provides guidance to help RBC and NCC scrutinise plans developers put forward, for the proposed development of thousands of new homes at the site.
Without it, the Councils do not have the benefit of the guidance to help hold developers to account on their plans to build homes with more detailed assurances such as key infrastructure on schools and doctors’ surgeries being built in a way that can help new communities – and avoid placing increased pressures on existing local services.
The Council considers that the Judicial Review should not go ahead because:
- If successful in the courts, it will not prevent development on the site but instead could make it less accountable and sustainable and threaten the impact on local amenity and services.
- The site has been allocated for development, subject to planning application processes, since 2014. It is important so RBC can reach government housing targets and there are enough homes for future generations to live in Rushcliffe.
- The cost to the taxpayer would be expected in excess of £100,000 – money that could be better invested in services to Rushcliffe people.
RBC has made some refinements to the SPD. They have consulted with the Environment Agency, Natural England and Historic England on an updated Strategic Environmental Assessment(SEA) and Habitats Regulation Assessment(HRA) scoping report and will discuss these refinements further at their Cabinet meeting on June 23.
The conclusions of the consultation support the previous view taken by RBC that the SPD does not require a SEA or HRA and these issues have been taken into account previously.
Understanding the sentiment and sensitivity of views on the site and former airfield, RBC continues to liaise with the campaign group and listen to their concerns.
It asks the group to withdraw the Judicial Review, which would not stop any planning applications being determined, and instead to continue to work with the Council on the planning process ahead.