I am writing in a private capacity to comment on the new Local Plan.
Firstly I would like to congratulate the Council on such a well thought through set of guiding principles; at the level at which these are presented they are hard to argue with.
The devil of course is in the detail as this moves to the next stage and I would like to raise a few comments from the perspective of a long-term resident of Rowington which is proposed as one of the 'category 2' villages.
1. It is not clear whether 'village' refers to the Parish of Rowington or just to the village. You will be aware that Rowington Parish includes Lowsonford, Pinley, Holywell, Mouseley End and even a small portion of Kingswood. While the Parish is well defined by a recognised parish boundary, the village of Rowington would be much more difficult to circumscribe. My preference would be to replace 'village' with 'Parish'. This would also help with anomalies such as potential development site R04 which would be generally thought of as being in Lapworth but actually falls within Rowington Parish. If you continue with the 'village' categorisation then it is not clear whether this would be decided by Lapworth or Rowington Parish Council.
2. I support the proposal for a modest amount of development in the Parish, especially of more affordable housing, to prevent stagnation and this is already included as one of the principles in our Parish Plan. I would however like to see specific proposals for ensuring that 'affordable' housing remains affordable, perhaps through a stipulation that a proportion of new development must be given over to housing trusts.
3. I support in principle the proposal to remove parts of the Parish from the green belt to ease development but I have concerns about how this would be implemented. If this is left to the Parish Council then I would have concerns about their ability to decide the matter dispassionately. There is a significant risk in Rowington that decisions would reflect the interests of the Parish Clerk, Parish Councillors and active lobby groups such as the Lowsonford Conservation Society (which actually receives funding from the Parish Council). This would tend to push development towards those areas of the Parish where opposition to development is not as well organised and this is not in the long term best interests of the Parish as a whole.
4. I would like to see Warwick District Council draw up a code of practice, that Parish Councils would be required to adopt, to ensure a clear, transparent and public consultation and decision making process when the green belt boundary is being redefined and potential development sites are identified.
5. I note that option PO14 includes walking routes under the heading of sustainable transport. The Rowington Parish Plan contains an action to provide a safe walking route between Rowington and Lapworth which is the location of the nearest school, shops and rail link. At the moment there is only a dangerous road with no footpath. It would be good to see a statement in the local plan that funding could be made available to support the creation of sustainable walking routes such as this.