Object

Representation ID: 67511

Received: 12/12/2014

Respondent: The Warwick Society

Legally compliant? Not specified

Sound? No

Duty to co-operate? Not specified

Further work carried out by Warwickshire County Council and its consultants has failed to resolve the inadequacy of the phase 4 Transport Strategy. Its effect, with the proposed development on greenfield land, will be to increase congestion and worsen air quality in Warwick and Leamington town centres. The Plan remains unsupported by a sustainable transport scheme. On this ground too it fails, therefore, to comply with the NPPF.

The damage done to the historic environment by the inadequacy of the transport strategy and its 'mitigation' measures remains unresolved. No Heritage Impact Assessment of the Transport Strategy and its 'mitigation' (of traffic flows, not of environmental impact) on Listed Buildings and the Conservation Area of Warwick Town Centre has been carried out. The recent response of English Heritage to a planning application for the demolition of a 1960s house2
in the Conservation Area demonstrates the threat to the character of the Conservation Area and its
Listed Buildings should the proposed 'mitigations' be carried out. They would, at Bridge End, Castle Hill, St John's, Eastgate, and probably at Northgate, cause immediate visual damage. In the longer term, the economic impact of failing to protect and enhance the settings of buildings affected by increased traffic throughout the town centre would place at risk the maintenance and condition of over two hundred Listed Buildings. Again, the failure of the Plan to comply with the requirements of the NPPF for the historic environment is a deficiency of the 'Focussed Changes'.