RESIDENT'S COMMENTS
TO: Mr I Halsall, Planning Officer, Swindon Borough Council,
Wat Tyler House, Beckhampton Street, Swindon, SN1 2JH
Resident’s Name & Address:
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I am/we are concerned about the following issues:-
Road congestion/traffic impact: The proposal has seemingly unrealistic forecasts of the impact of the development on existing traffic flows and there are concerns that the traffic assessment does not accurately reflect the impact of the proposals. This leads to serious concerns that existing local roads, along with the main routes that they feed into, cannot handle the additional traffic that will arise from this application. The plans propose just three points of exit for traffic, Oakhurst Way, Saltzgitter Drive and through Blunsdon Village, none of which is suitable for the addition of large volumes of traffic. There is also no direct route from the proposed site to the town centre or main employment areas, which will also lead to an increase in traffic leaving the site. The proposed rapid transport route is unfeasible as it will have to share the existing roads with no ability to use bus lanes. The increased volumes of traffic will have an adverse impact on the quality of life of the existing communities, along with the associated safety risks for roads that are already difficult for school children and pedestrians to cross. The area of search defined in the traffic modelling is not comprehensive and does not take into account the views of the community which were expressed at the developers’ consultation.
The existing local infrastructure is already overstretched with traffic frequently queuing as it attempts to leave the Oakhurst area via Oakhurst Way/Garsington Drive to get down Mead Way to reach West Swindon/M4 Jct. 16, along Tadpole Lane to reach Cirencester/A419 /M4 Jct. 15 and along Thamesdown Drive. The Cold Harbour Lane roundabout is already congested at peak times. The addition of the traffic from 1,700 houses at the proposed Tadpole Farm will further exacerbate the traffic issues on the existing infrastructure and turn local roads into major highways. Blunsdon residents took years to get a bypass and reunite the two sides of the village. Now this is going to be undone by an ill-conceived new access road. Traffic should have been diverted away from local roads by the delivery of the promised Haydon III off-site highways works.
Saltgitter Drive is a narrow, windy road where at certain points a car and a bus cannot pass at the same time. With the additional traffic from the 450 houses planned at the Abbey Stadium and the increase in traffic from the proposed Tadpole Farm application this local road will become a major highway from Lady Lane/Tadpole Lane to Thamesdown Drive.
There is no ‘joined up’ traffic modelling between Wiltshire Council/Swindon Borough Council/the Highways Agency and the developers. Although there is an application for 800 houses at Ridgeway Farm this is not taken into account with the traffic modelling. Neither is the additional 450 homes planned for the Abbey Stadium. The Government’s proposed planning framework sets down the principle that development on the border between two local authorities should not be dealt with in isolation and the cumulative impact should be taken into consideration.
School places: there is already a shortage of school places in the Northern Sector with temporary school classrooms being installed at many primary schools to meet current demand levels (with the subsequent issue that the communal facilities, such as school halls, canteens, sports pitches etc, were not designed for the numbers of pupils this results in). The introduction of more houses, which would be built and occupied before any potential new school place provision on the site, will compound the shortage of places in the existing schools. There is also no clear indication of how the secondary school provision will be met, with no guarantee that there will be any local provision. This will increase the need for travelling to a more distant school which will further increase the traffic issues for the site. There is a current need for an additional eight forms of entry at secondary level and this outline application does not provide for this need/or any additional need.
Impact on existing communities: the existing community facilities such as doctors, dentists, shops, restaurants, etc are already inadequate to meet the demands placed on them by the current communities and there is no evidence that the application will provide sufficient facilities in the proposed Tadpole Farm development. This will lead to even further demands being placed on the existing services as it can be expected that houses will be built well before the associated community facilities in a new development – if the facilities are ever provided.
Waste disposal: the waste water network in North and North West Swindon is already at full capacity with the existing number of houses (based on evidence from Thames Water Utilities Ltd) and there are no realistic plan as to how capacity can or will be increased to cope with the additional houses at Tadpole Farm.
Flood risk: substantial parts of the land on the Tadpole Farm site already experience flooding, with houses along Tadpole Farm having been affected over the last five years. The addition of more of the surrounding land being built on will reduce the ability of the land to cope with water absorption and will therefore increase the amount of run-off water that the limited infrastructure will have to cope with. This will increase the risk of properties in the existing communities being affected by flooding.
Additional comments:
