1. Introduction

1.1 This document has been prepared by Warwick District Council in order for you to be able to comment on the Council's preferred approach for how it deals with the future growth and development of the District for the period up to 2026. This consultation stage is referred to as the 'Preferred Options' and forms part of the process the Council is currently working through in preparing its first ever Core Strategy.

What is the Core Strategy?

1.2 The Core Strategy is a very important document which will set the long term vision for how the District's towns, villages and countryside will develop and change over the period to 2026. This vision will be delivered through a strategy for distributing and delivering growth within the District, alongside a number of strategic objectives which will be used to inform the Council's decision making on future planning applications for development. However, it is important to note that the Core Strategy is a strategic document and should not contain detailed policies or site allocations unless the site is central to the delivery of the Core Strategy.

1.3 The Council is required by legislation to prepare a Core Strategy, and the nature and content of the Strategy must comply with a number of requirements including:

• Be consistent with National Planning Policy Statements (PPS);

• Conform generally to the West Midlands Regional Spatial Strategy (RSS) or the emerging RSS Phase Two Revision - Draft Preferred Option (RSS Phase Two);

• Be coherent with neighbouring Core Strategies, such as the emerging Coventry Core Strategy;

• Align with and help deliver the Warwick District Sustainable Community Strategy (SCS); and,

• Be based on robust and credible evidence

1.4 These requirements inevitably constrain the options that are available for the Council in terms of how it plans its growth and these are identified in the subsequent sections of this paper.

What is the Programme for the Core Strategy?

1.5 There are a number of stages in the preparation of the Core Strategy as shown below.

1.6 You will see that the Council has already undertaken two stages of consultation as part of the preparation phases and details of these stages can be found on the Council's website.

1.7 The purpose of the "Preferred Options" stage is to identify and seek the public's views on the Council's favoured option for how it proposes to deal with growth and development in strategic terms in the future. Please read each section of this paper and consider whether we have identified all the options available, and whether we have identified the right preferred option. The following sections of the "Preferred Options" Paper are structured as follows: