See attached
Section 7 Additional Sheet
H52 forms an expansion of a parcel of land which failed to get planning permission with Warwick District Council and then went to the Inspectorate and gained outline planning permission. We are in agreement with WDC on their original objections. In addition the following form a list of objections to this site:
a) Coalescence with Sydenham. Consideration should not only be given to the shortest distance from Sydenham to Radford Semele but also to the average distance between closest line of houses and most importantly the area of land between the two. Each time a parcel of land is allocated to housing on the west of Radford Semele, that "area" of separation gets eroded.
b) In the past few years there has been severe flooding on The Valley, Valley Road and the bottom of Williams Road. The reduction of open land to the West of Williams Road is likely to worsen that, especially the area towards the bottom of the site which is also the bottom of a hill.
c) With approx. 120 new houses on this joint development there are likely to be around 34 primary age children, none of which will ever be likely to find a place at Radford Semele School. The School by 2017 is likely to be substantially full, especially since there will be an extra 17 or so children to try to accommodate from the new development at W/14/0322. Once children are accepted into the Reception class they usually remain in the school for 7 years. That means that for at least the first 7 years the only children from the new joint development who have a chance to join the local school will be in the Reception class.
d) I have spoken to the Manager of the Pre-School on the site of Radford Semele School who informs me that there are currently no spaces at the Pre-School to accommodate children from these new developments, a situation which is likely to worsen with the government extending nursery education grant from 15 hours to 30, in September 2017. Therefore all new families requiring nursery care will also have to find it outside the village making the traffic problems worse.
e) Access can only be gained through School Lane. This will worsen an already extremely difficult situation at School start/end times which is already due to get worse once the land houses are built on the parcel which already holds planning permission (W/14/0433). As explained in points 3 & 4 above, this means that approx. 34 extra cars journeys will be using school lane at exactly the busiest times of the day to exit/enter to take their children to a school outside of the village, in addition to nursery school journeys. As the Inspector pointed out (Appeal Ref: APP/T3725/A/14/2221858), the situation is already bad and this information should be sufficient to indicate that it will significantly worsen at precisely the worse times of day. I doubt that the School Lane/Southam Road junction can be widened to incorporate a 2 lane exit from School Lane. Without this the situation will be hopeless.
In conclusion, the separation between Radford Semele and Sydenham is being constantly eroded to such a point that with the new proposals there will be only one field protecting the integrity of the village from losing its identity. WDC have sited the Primary School and Pre-School at Radford Semele to be an important reason for identifying the village as a prime location for new housing. It should be understood that almost all of the primary school and Pre-School aged children who move into this new development (and any subsequent developments) will not gain a place at the school and will need to travel outside the village for primary schooling making a very poor situation on School Lane a lot worse or untenable. This situation would take at least 7 years to rectify for each new development and that assumes that the school has enough capacity to displace children outside the village in favour of ones inside the village over the next 10 years. It is unlikely that WDC have consulted with the Primary School to ascertain how many new children could be accommodated in the short/medium/long term.