Radford Semele Church at the edge of this site is a listed building which has recently been the subject of extensive renovations following a fire. This church and the surrounding land are what visitors to Radford Semele see as they arrive in the village from any direction. The fact that, unlike many churches in villages, the church in Radford Semele is set in open land makes for an unusual setting and view. Other towns and villages where councils have in the past preserved open spaces (Harrogate which I know well with The Stray, open space around the middle of the town, for example) have ensured that the local environment is enjoyed by all and remains a place where people want to live. Open spaces between built areas add rather than detract and Radford Semele currently has that benefit which would be lost if Site 1 is selected. Building on this land would permanently destroy this vista and would be unlikely to be planned to fit with the surrounding housing stock which includes a converted old water tower and thatched cottages. In addition to the Church, the White Lion Pub is also a listed building which was also substantially renovated following a fire. This pub attracts people to the village due to it's location which is greatly enhanced by the view across the field to the church and open countryside beyond. Visitors to the White Lion are visiting an old country pub in a beautiful location. This location and views around it would be destroyed by a housing estate which goes against the responsibility of the council to protect the setting of listed buildings and particularly when the line of sight between listed buildings is impacted which in this case it will be significantly.

In the past all development in this area has been sensitive to the local environment and is not clearly visible from the road (eg. the houses at the bottom of Church End). Planning applications for development on this field in the past have been rejected because of the requirements for the council to protect a listed building and it's setting. No changes have taken place to justify abandoning the need to conceal development around the setting of a listed building.

The A425 road running through Radford Semele is already an extremely busy and dangerous road. Should a large housing estate be built on this land then the volume of traffic would be significantly increased. Under planning guidelines an extra 100 houses requires an assumption of 200+ additional cars. To my knowledge no study has been undertaken to determine the impact of these extra vehicles exiting onto the Southam Road from the proposed development, although enough work has been done to exclude other sites, which is somewhat surprising and rather concerning given the requirement to provide a balanced summary for discussion.

The access to the site would need to be either directly onto Southam Road between School Lane and Offchurch Lane or indirectly via Church Lane. Both of these options are ill considered from a safety point of view and would necessitate substantial changes to the current road layout. There seems to be a great play being made of land being made available as a 'village green', however the requirement to widen Church Lane and to provide an access via a link road, would I suspect mean that little 'green' was left for people to enjoy.There is already a pedestrian crossing at this junction for children to access Radford Semele School. This crossing is currently unmanned. The safety of children going to school would be severely compromised by up to 200 more cars attempting to join Southam Road in the morning to go to work. The problems currently experienced on School Lane (narrow road, parked cars, lots of traffic in both directions and children going to and from school) are already known, and it would appear largely ignored in the planning process. The fact that the police have recently scheduled visits to speak to school parents to point out the dangers should highlight the issues. However, having many more cars join the A425 at this point will certainly exacerbate the problems on School Lane as traffic finds it even more difficult to exit and enter the road.

Currently I can up to 10 minutes for a gap in the traffic to exit my driveway in the morning and in the evening I regularly have to wait many minutes to get into my drive across heavy and often speeding traffic. Should there be an access road opposite my house this would be even more dangerous for me, my family, other road users and pedestrians. With Offchurch Lane joining Southam Road on a blind bend, cars attempting to turn out of it often accelerate very quickly to avoid accidents on this blind corner. During my 12 years in this house I am aware of the air ambulance attending 2 serious accidents on this corner, together with several less serious accidents only requiring an ambulance. If another access road was positioned on this stretch of road this could only lead to more serious accidents.

As Radford Semele School has been significantly expanded and is currently full, any additional children living on the proposed housing estate would need to be transported by car to school outside the village further increasing traffic at peak times. School Lane is regularly a bottleneck in the morning with people leaving the village to go to work at the same time as others arrive to drop off their children. Should this development take place there would need to be significant changes to the road layout at this junction and on School Lane to accommodate the increased traffic.

In recent years there have been several incidents of overflowing sewerage and other drainage problems at the bottom of School Lane and flowing down Church Lane. The junction of the A425/School Lane/Church lane has often in the past been flooded with rain water flowing down into Church Lane from both sides on the A425 and from the top of the village down School Lane and sewerage has as a consequence overflowed and been swept down Church Lane. This could only be further exacerbated by the building of a high density housing estate directly opposite with its own drainage needs and requirements that are planned to discharge to the same point

No work, it seems, has been undertaken to understand the ecological impact of building this area. A particular issue being whether that would have an impact on the bats that currently enjoy this open space and can be seen throughout the area down to the Church.

I believe that there are other potential sites (Sites 2 and 3, though specifically 2) which have been incorrectly discounted in favour of Site 1 (see Sites Review comments) which would be more fit for purpose. Even with the current 50mph limit on approaching the village from Southam the sites to the East of the village (sites 2 and 3) are more appropriate for development, as has been confirmed by two independent traffic experts and would be even more so with an extension to the 30mph limit in the village which would be a correct interpretation of Dept of Transport guidance rather than the incorrect assessment currently made (see Sites Review comments). This land is obscured from the Fosse Way by the naturally rolling countryside, and is not as is stated in the Environmental Report highly visible from the fosse Way. Residents of houses on site 2 would be able to use public footpaths to access the facilities of the village without the need to cross the busy Southam Road.