It's no longer just the undue weight given to traffic assessments that has me exercised now; I'm also deeply concerned about the way residents' comments are presented. Here's an example of what I mean:
We recently had a planning application for 150 homes, to straddle the boundary between Hart and Rushmoor, and the vast majority of the many respondents to the consultation were broadly in favour, although almost all were vehemently opposed to the current proposal because of the access point for the development, right beside a junior school on a very busy and entirely inadequate residential road. But because they had made some positive remarks about the development as well as some negative ones, they have been deemed 'Neutral', which, given the vehemence of their opposition to the access point is clearly ridiculous.
I only hope that the members of the Development Control Committee read all the comments carefully, rather than simply noting whether they are in favour, opposed, or neutral, because those designations give an entirely misleading view of local opinion.
Looking to the future, I believe there should be a means by which respondents to planning consultations should be given the opportunity to indicate for themselves how their comments should be interpreted, rather than a planning officer making that determination.
Thinking about what I've learned about the planning system, I think it's high time there was a thorough review of the whole thing if the idea of 'localism' is the have any meaning, because, as things stand, the public seems absolutely impotent to influence something that can have life-changing effects.
No comments:
Post a Comment