Kingswood (Lapworth)

Please would you state clearly what the criteria have been for allocating Category 1 or 2 status to villages.
Please would you also state clearly what the criteria are for deciding on location of housing developments within villages. When , and how, will these be decided? What consultation is planned?
Where schools, roads, services (such as gas, parking, trains, buses, retail, etc) are scarcely adequate now, will proposals be put forward for resolving these challenges before, rather than after, the housing plan goes too far? How and when will these questions be discussed with local residents?
When will gypsy/traveller sites be proposed?
Will tree preservation orders be respected, or could they be overridden just as greenbelt status is being?
I look forward to a full, but also quick, response.
Haydn Rees

I am not against development in Lapworth per se. I do think 150 new homes is too many and have seen no evidence there is a need for this many new homes. The Lapworth Parish Council Housing Needs Survey of 2010 showed very little new housing need. There are also currently around 50 homes of a mixture of sizes for sale in Lapworth and many of these have been for sale for more than a year. Why are these not selling if there is demand from people to live here?
At the consultation event at Lapworth Village Hall on 17th June, site options were presented. I am against the additional infilling between existing properties on Station Lane. The National Policy Planning Framework says that sustainable development should be pursured and this involves "improving the conditions in which people, live, work, travel and take leisure." Adding extra houses to a lane which currently still has a rural aspect to it in parts may well improve the lives of those moving into the new houses, but will impact negatively in a significant way on those that already live on the road. The NPPF also says "plans should recognise the intrinsic beauty of the countryside". Walking down Station Lane to catch an early morning train and seeing the sun rising over the fields on the east of the lane is a pleasure that will disappear if the field views are taken away by building houses on the roadside edge of the fields. The lane is also too narrow to cope with cars parked outside new properties, which with the numbers of cars per household required because there is inadequate public transport, will almost inevitably happen unless the houses are built with drives capable of taking three or four cars for family homes and two cars for two bedroom homes. I think far better would be to build small closes at right angles to Station Lane at various points or from the other roads in Kingswood - Mill Lane, Rising Lane and the Old Warwick Road, leaving some open views from the lanes and taking the car parking off the lanes and onto cul de sacs.

Communications: Cllr Alan Cockburn said "Good broadband connections are essential to modern life, whether for work, leisure or learning. Our rural businesses need broadband to be able to compete in today's increasingly global environment, and in a rural area like Warwickshire travelling can often be difficult, so that being able to work or learn from home can make a real difference to the quality of peoples' lives." This same statment could be applied to mobile phone signal, which is currently atrocious on most of Station Lane. If Lapworth is to receive more housing it needs to have both better mobile phone signal and be within the 91% getting superfast broadband.

Transport: There are only a few businesses offering local employment so public transport to sites of employment and leisure need reviewing. Trains provide a limited service to Birmingham, Solihull, Warwick and Leamington. There currently isn't and should be a bus service at commuting times to the Blythe Valley Business Park, the nearest significant centre of employment and there should be a frequent bus service to Knowle for shopping if the community is going to be sustainable.

The ideas for possible development in Lapworth outlined at the Drop-In session on 17th June are indefensible. Lapworth does not have the services to cope with any major development. It has just one bus per day, a very limited rail service with no prospect of improvement, (many locals have to drive to Dorridge or Warwick Parkway stations as a result), a small and full primary school, no Warwick secondary school anywhere near, only one small general store, narrow roads, inadequate parking facilities in places, and no obvious employment opportunities in the village. In addition the possible developments along Station Lane would ruin one of the most attractive open areas in the village, thereby irredeemably damaging the area's rural character. It would also exacerbate existing traffic problems around the school and the station. The combination of no local demand for extra housing, no local jobs, extremely limited services, and environmental harm must lead to a major rethink about the size and location of any development.

We are currently due to buy 13 kingswood close due to its idyllic location with beautiful open views to the back of the property - something which we have spent 12 months trying to find in an area close to amenities and transport links - to take this away from the village and the outlook of all of the houses in the kingswood area is completely unnecessary and detrimental to the quality of life fro people along kingswood close.

I don't understand why this is Kingswood/Lapworth and not Lapworth as a whole.

100-150 new houses is far too many houses and will ruin the rural feel of Lapworth.

Don't understand why Kingswood/Lapworth is classed as a category 1 village.

Why haven't been provided with sufficient information or in a timely manner to make this consultation worthwhile.

I object to the proposals in the revised plan for the following reasons:
1 The size of the proposed development is inappropriate to the size of Lapworth village.
2. There is no major source of employment that could sustain such an expansion. The majority of new residents would be forced to commute for work.
3. Transport:The rail service is poor, only 16 trains per day stop in each direction, for periods of over 2 hours no trains stop. Chiltern Railways have no incentive to improve this service and reportedly wish to close Lapworth Station. The bus service only runs 3 days per week. It is almost impossible to live in the village without the use of a car. Inclusion within Category 1 is erroneous.
4. Flooding. All surface water and canal leakage drains into Kingswood Brook. Because of restrictions caused by culverts under the canals the brook is limited in it's capacity to handle floodwater. Any development to the south of Station Lane will be at considerable flood risk.
5. Recreation: Lapworth has no recreational facilities for children, no playing field, no afterschool club, no youth club. The scout hut was demolished.
6. Education: The village school is already close to capacity. Any major increase in population would require a substantial redevelopment of the school and re-engineering of the traffic which blocks Station Lane twice per day during schooldays. Older children have to be bused to Stratford, Henley or Alcester or driven by private car

I am opposed to the number of houses planned for the Kingswood area of Lapworth. The planned 100 to 150 new houses represent an increase in housing of 31% to 46% in the Kingswood area, a huge proportion which will alter the character of the area. While I am not opposed to phased small scale development distributed throughout Lapworth, I am strongly opposed to major development in any part of Lapworth, including Kingswood. Any development should blend into the existing landscape and not eat into greenbelt land. There are other possible sites identified in Lapworth that seem to be ignored.
I am also concerned that the issue we have at the moment with surface water flooding in the Kingswood area will only be made worse by more house building.
Traffic on Station Lane is already congested around the school and the Lees Chapel at busy times and this will be exacerbated.

as per document prepared by council - infrastructure plan -
school site is heavily constrained to accommodate expansion.
Henley high school is already at capacity.

We wish to propose the attached development site as suitable for inclusion within the requirements for housing in Kingswood/Lapworth area in accordance with your draft Local-Plan. Site is approximately 1.1 acres of level land, bordered by housing and canal. We feel it fits the criteria of requirements within your draft-documentation and request it's put forward for consideration of the Local Plan Housing Allocations in Autumn. We support Council's proposals for completion of up to 150 units in Kingswood/Lapworth area and recognise these need to be within the Green-Belt land - our scheme would be an appropriate extension in the village-boundary.

I wish to object to the categorisation of Lapworth(or is it Kingswood) as a category 1 major service provider village for the following reasons:
1.It is served by only infrequent and limited public transport.
2. The nearest large village for me to shop is Knowle which is 4 miles from where I live. Hockley Heath is not an appropriate place to shop and the village shop is a very limited resource - too far to walk but nowhere to park.
It seems likely that we may also loose the facility of our post office.
3. Lapworth does not fit the same characteristics as other much larger category 1 villages.

150 new houses on top of windfall growth is out of all proportion to the size of Lapworth. This will mean a growth of between 25% and 30% increase in the size of the village. This goes against statements in National Planning Document that express a desire to preserve the nature and character of communities. It does not protect the green belt nor recognise the intrinsic character or beauty of the area.

It is also out of all comparison with the 18% growth over the last 20years. It is not supported by the local Housing Needs Survey or projections by the Office of National Statistics.

The infrastructure of our village does not support this level of growth. For example much of the electricity supply is still carried by overhead cables. I personally have lost electricity supply to my property 10 times within the last 12 months.

As there is a lack of jobs in the local area residents will need to travel out of the area by private vehicle as there is insufficient public transport thus increasing congestion and pollution.

The National planning framework states that historic evidence of windfall growth in an community can be used as mitigation against the total number of projected properties required.

When has the number of properties been changed from 80 to 150?

I understand that the Old Warwick Road boundary between Lapworth & Rowington is the stream in the vicinity of the Navigation Inn. This places the old Kingswood Nurseries site (a possible site of development) within the village of Rowington. However, it has a considerably closer connection to the current sites of housing in Lapworth & thus would seem more appropriate that any housing development there would count towards the allocated numbers suggested for Lapworth.

Kingswood (Lapworth) should not be classed as a primary service village because local services and transport in particular are just not good enough. There is no prospect of the train service improving as Chiltern Railways are making it worse each time it is changed. The suggestion by a Council representative that this doesn't matter because people will use cars instead is just madness. Houses and transport should be co-ordinated so that people need to use cars less, not more.

The proposed infill developments on the East side of Station Lane are unimaginative and out of keeping with the rural environment. If houses have to be built then it would be better to create a new close off Station Lane for them and leave some of the green aspects of Station Lane.

Kingswood (Lapworth)

The scale of the plan applying to the Kingswood area is far too great. This will overburden infrastructure, services and environment in the area. Communication and consultation has been very poor, there should have been direct correspondence to all residents notifying the intentions.

We are resident in Lapworth Yew Tree Close, as residents we witness the daily struggle of the local roads to cope with the current amount of traffic to and from the schools, morning and afternoon. I have personally witness many accidents and near misses in this area due to the current volumes of people/cars on this road. The Old Warwick rd is already a very fast dangerous road passing through Lapworth where you will find children crossing the road blind from the small village shop, especially as the council have failed to provide adequate traffic calming measures. Another 100 houses means potentially an extra 200-400 residents all with cars. We fear Lapworth will no longer be a village but become an overspill of Solihull and will thus become a bigger drain on Council resources. On top of which the crime rate will rise, especially if there is social housing planned, and it already takes the Police force a far to long time to respond to incidents. As local residents who speak amongst the population of Lapworth I am sure 99% of the people are distraught over the idea that this area's very nice community will change forever!

I object to the number of new homes proposed for Lapworth I feel that a 25% increase in dwellings would significantly alter the character and nature of the parish a much smaller number would be appropriate

As a resident of Lapworth for over 20 years,I am responding to reject any plans to build a large number of houses within the area of kingswood and lapworth. this number of houses in this area is totally unaceptable due to a number of factors

1. the road infrastructure will not be able to cope
2. lack of natural gas within the area
3. impact on local schools
4. road traffic

looking at other areas that have been built in more recent times (Dickens Heath, Hatton) i feel the kingswood & lapworth area would be further selling its soul and losing its vital rural character that has build up such an amazing area to live.

This document is unclear, is not written in plain English and does not appear to contain a section defining the terms used.

What is a Primary Service Village? What is the definition and how is it decided that Lapworth is one?

I am not against new houses being built but I would want to see them in small clusters. I am unsure where the requirement for 100-150 new houses comes from. Is this published anywhere?

The impact on the village would be significant and I would like to see a proper consideration of how the growth in population would be dealt with e.g
* impact on Pre-School and School - how would the additional children be catered for in these settings, both of which have limits on capacity and, as far as I am aware, are operating close to full capacity already.

* public transport - bus and train services here are limited. Would transport be improved to help the new residents get to their place of work or will it be a requirement for all new residents to own a car? And how does this tie in with social housing requirements?

* parking - if there are going to be more children at our pre-school and school (if they will fit....), will the issue of parking at before and after school times be addressed?

* GP surgery - I am unaware what the capacity is here but will there be consultation with the practice to ascertain whether new residents can be accommodated.

There seems to be a huge amount of unanswered questions. It is unclear whether some of these questions may be answered in the myriad of related documents or whether they have yet to be addressed. The whole process has not been well communicated by the council. Many are only aware of it due to particularly active local groups.

Lapworth PC wishes to record lack of confidence in the processes and objectives adopted by Warwick District Council in preparing their draft plan as it was not put together in consultation with residents of our parish. Despite objections being raised in response to the Preferred Options plan proposal that up to 100 additional homes be built in Lapworth over the plan period, these objections have been ignored as evidenced by the revised proposal that 100 to 150 new homes be built. Also challenge its inclusion as a category 1 village. Full details of objections are contained in the attachment

We will be objecting to any large housing developments in the Kingswood rural area. This part of Old Warwick Road is already over crowded, with buildings and traffic. There is very little meadow land left for natural wildlife. Building more and more houses is only creating an estate feel to all the residents, who have chosen to live a rural life. There are many grade 2 listed properties in the Kingswood area, which are being smothered by modern buildings.
We hope you reconsider the local residents opinion and protect our rural Village.

I am concerned that the number of new properties proposed is unsustainable to the infrastructure of our village & the available amenities. The school , doctors etc could not cope without major redevelopment and enlarging of these facilities. To do so would change our village life greatly, impact upon the keen community spirit which exists, make the roads busier and more dangerous for our children, to name just the first issues which immediately spring to mind and cause the most concern. I appreciate that there is a need for new housing and development in warwickshire, but surely not to the detriment of village life, the very reason why we chose to live here in such a beautiful part of warwickshire. Please reconsider at least the scale of your proposals in Lapworth. 100 to 150 new homes in just too many. Thank you.

The infrastructure of Kingswood (Lapworth) is insufficiently developed to support the building of a large number of extra houses. The primary school is fairly small and there is not a secondary school nearby. Trains stop infrequently at Lapworth Station and the timetable for buses is very limited. There is only one general store. The highway along Station Lane is, in parts, narrow, particularly in the vicinity of the avenue of oak trees ( a number of which hold tree preservation orders) this would make creating new roads to serve housing development difficult. The District Council states that in order to build on green belt the existing village envelope would have to be extended. Present green belt policy allows building is 'very special circumstances'. The number of existing properties for sale, some of which have been for sale for a considerable time, would suggest that a demand for further housing in this village is not there, therefore large numbers of new houses does not meet the criteria of a 'very special circumstance'. Small developments of houses would seem more appropriate. The justification for including Kingswood (Lapworth) as a Category 1 Village would seem as if the pieces of a jigsaw were being forced to fit in with the general picture that says that 100-150 houses are required in this village.

I wish to object to the proposal that 100-150 houses be built in the kinsgwood (lapworth) area of the village for a number of reasons.
1. This is green belt land and as such should, unless in extreme circumstances, be considered sacrosanct in terms of house building. There is a viable farming business in the fields behind my house which sustains the landscape and provides employment for the farmer. Without green belt there is no 'rural life' and Lapworth will become a suburb of Warwick joining eventually with Rowington and Hatton.
2. The greenbelt provides a natural habitat for a number of diverse wild animals such as badgers, foxes, deer and many wild birds, sparrow hawk, red kites, buzzards, woodpeckers etc.
3. the village has grown over the years but the supporting infrastructure and services are just coping with current levels. How can it cope with a potential for 300+ more residents with a possible 200+ cars needing to use the exisiting transport links to the major local towns or highways?Will the council be able to ensure more buses, trains are provided to improve the transport links for these additional villagers? Car traffic is already a major concern to station lane residents and as a parent with a child at school in the village I am only too aware of the difficulties and dangers to pedestrians especially, of the increased flow of traffic around the school at drop off and collection times.
as a horse rider and cyclist, both of which are common past times in the village, how will the council ensure that the roads will cope with all levels of increased traffic?
Station lane cannot be widened as frontages are present. Kingswood close is also a narrow at times, single file road.
4. The school already operates a system of combining year groups as it has insufficient staffing and classrooms to accomodate a class per year group. Will the LEA provide further funding to accomodate many more pupils?
5. There was insufficient information initially available to residents regarding the proposals for the village.
6. Lapworth has a few local businesses but the employment opportunities are limited within the village and surrounding areas. This will also increase the need for car usage and thus the increase in local traffic in the kingswood area with problems already identified.
7. How has the village be re-categorised? This has not been clearly explained by the council. Other areas of the village ought to be explored if housing is to be considered rather than creating a 'Hatton' Style devlopment in the Kingswood area alone - Kingswood is Lapworth.
8. 160-166 Station Lane has a poor drainage system which periodically blocks. This would need major exploration and repair works to cope with further properties.
9.The fields behind 160-166 Station lane and adjoining Kingswood Close are liable to extensive flooding adjacent to the canal.

I feel strongly that although there is a need to consider further housing development to cope with the growing population for the disctrict of Warwick and Lapworth in particular, there are many convincing reasons not to concentrate the extensive suggested housing development in the Kingswood area alone.
Anon

The plan for 100 to 150 new dwellings in the Kingswood settlement is disproprtionate and unjustifiable for 2 main reasons:
1. Kingswood has 842 residents and 381 dwellings. The relevant figures for the other 4 Primary Service Villages are Hampton Magna 1431 and 602, Bishops Tachbrook 1700 and 737, Radford Semele 1890 and 803, Cubbington 2183 and 980. It is unjustifiable therefore to expect all these settlements to take the same number of new dwellings. 150 new dwellings represents a 39% increase for Kingswood whilst for Hampton Magna it is 25% and Cubbington 15%. How is this justifiable?
In the Settlement Hierarchy Report Section 5.9, you state that the baseline growth rate target is 20% for Primary Service Villages and 15% for Secondary Villages. This would give Kingswood an allocation of 76, Hampton Magna 120, BT 147, RS 160 and Cubbington 196 - total 699 or an average of 140 each, but spread equitably.
Any case for faster growth than the 20% has to be based on superior services, and that is clearly not the case even from your scoring system, since Kingswood has the joint second lowest score of the Primary Service Villages. This brings me on to my second point:
2. Kingswood does not merit 53 points. The following scores are wrong:
- bus service - we do not have a daily bus service according to your website referenced - 2 points should therefore not be awarded.
- access to main town by public transport (bus) is so limited that 0 points should be given
- Post Office 3 marks - for sale and considered very likely to close. This should therefore not be counted.
- Village Shop is very small, has no scope for expansion and no car parking spaces at all. It is also not in "a cluster of shops and services". It should receive a maximum of 5 rather than 6 marks
- Place of Worship 3 marks - Lees Chapel is a specialist denomination rather than CoE. It is not a place which most Kingswood church-goers use. Should not be counted
- recreational open space 3 marks - every town and village will have footpaths and fields/parks to walk on so presumably every place in the world would score 3 points by this definition. Kingswood has no playing fields or sporting areas for young people.
- our primary school is contrained as indicated in an earlier report. It should therefore get 5 rather than 6 marks
Overall, these adjustments would lead to a drop from 53 marks to the low 40s. This in turn would make Kingswood a Secondary Service Village, and as mentioned above, that lowers the baseline target growth rate to 15%. In terms of new dwellings this reduces the target to 381 * 15% which equals 57 new dwellings. This would bring Kingswood into line with Cubbington.

Finally I have to object to the process by which early sites seem to have been identified. This involved no consultation or discussion with local residents. Some of the sites indicated have obvious problems with them, and others would be extremely damaging environmentally. The omission of other possible sites from investigation is also very surprising. I presume that all these questions will be answered when the next proposal emerges. Obviously 57 new houses would be a lot less challenging to site than 150!

As a resident in the heart of the proposed development area i would like to go on record as to opposing the current consultation due to the following reasons:

Lack of disclosure and communication

In relation to the initial consultation of the proposed development of Kingswood/ Lapworth the manner in informing residents of Lapworth was not carried out in a open fashion. It was only during a conversation with a neighbour after the effect that we found out about the planned development in our village. We are led to believe that notices were put on the village notice boards but as I do not frequent these on regular basis I was not informed. I am surprise that an important topic of proposing to increase our village size by more than 25% could not be communicated in a more open fashion or through a bin hanger as all residents are informed of refuse collection changes in this manner.

Subsequently, I have regularly attended both the parish council meetings and the drop in centre that was held in the village hall and every time the topic comes up there has not been a consistent message or approach that the Council is taking in carrying out the consultation period. At the "drop in" centre we met with the planning officer from the council who was displaying a list of the proposed sites for development and a map showing the proposed sites under consideration. We were informed although the sites were listed they were not defined as some of the site owners had not been approached. How are residents supposed to made a judgement on information that is neither defined or qualitative. On requesting more information as the map was no bigger than A5 in size all those present we were asked by a planning officer to provide our email addresses on a piece of paper and he would send us all the information within 24 hours. As of the parish council meeting on the 8 July 2013 this information was not provided. I expressed my concerns to Councillor Caborn who was going to take this up with the planning officers and subsequently we have only been provided with the newer version of the information on the 19 July 2013 which has only provided all residents with 10 Days before the end of the consultation period to review it's contents.

I respectfully request that the consultation period be put on hold until full disclosure of the process and information is provided to the residents of Lapworth so that we are consulted rather than dictated to and kept in the dark.

Classification of Village Status

As expressed above I am not as informed as I feel I should be on the matter, however I am to believe that the village has been classified as a primary village which originally we were informed we were being allocated 80-100 houses. I am now being informed that this could increase to 150 dwellings of which 40 % being cost affordable housing.

We are informed by Councillor Caborn that the initial allocation was based on school, shop, railway station and post office. On paper that might be factual however I am informed that the school would not be able to sustain a increase to this proposed level. The shop has limited parking outside with a proposal for double yellow lines on one side of the road which will limit further parking. The railway station is not considered as a mainline usual stop and I personally travel to Dorridge to commute to London on a weekly basis. Lastly the post office, I have recently been informed that the wine merchant that houses the post office is up for sale and reliably informed that limited interest in the business could result in the post office closing. In addition the village does not have full services as mainline gas is not present in all parts of the village.

Given the above I would encourage the Council to operate on hard facts rather than paper facts when considering classification.

Local Plan consultation: Objection to Lapworth/ kings wood development

In respect of this consultation I wish to place on record that I object to the development on the following reasons.

Classification of village. Lapworth/Kingswood has been categorised as a Primary Service village based on the 53 marks allocated to it in the Draft Settlement Hierarchy Report. The marking seems unrealistically high, given the lack of and potential future loss of amenities, e.g. No mainline gas, lack of cable tv, potential sale/loss of post office, reduced train services.

Direct impact on Station Lane. All development is concentrated on Station Lane. This road is already hazardous. Station Lane is a narrow road which is severely congested at the start and closure of each school day and when there is an event at the Lees Chapel. Has consideration been given to how Station Lane and the other roads in Kingswood will cope with the increased vehicular traffic emanating from 100-150 new houses?


Residents have purchased property in Lapworth/ Kingswood specifically for its village community and rural living. Proposed development of 100-150 new houses concentrated in one main area will dramatically impact on this chosen lifestyle as well as property value. Properties were purchased in Station Lane due to overlooking attractive greenbelt land. Had residents wished to live in a built up area they would have bought in for example, Dickens Heath, Monkspath.

Furthermore, the required allocation of 40% cost affordable housing is of concern. Supported by the fact that the next closest village with amenities such as for example a supermarket is Knowle,which would realistically not be suitable for occupancy of these dwellings.

It is difficult to understand the need for the proposed housing to be built in Kingswood other than for increased revenue for Warwick District Council.
The facilities for transport are poor with bus services being so few that the majority discount it as non existent. Train services for Lapworth are every 2 hours during the day, Chiltern Rail have no plans to increase their services as they see our village as a stop which slows their journey times to London and Birmingham.
The local primary school is an accident waiting to happen. Congestion on Station lane with parents dropping off or collecting children is chaotic, any increase in pupils would necessitate far greater parking facilities and considerable changes to the layout of Station Lane outside the school.
Chessets Wood Road has far more land for any development needed with plenty of land between houses and easier access to better travel facilities at Dorridge Station.

Please see sense and reconsider this proposal.

(NB representation is constrained by low word count number!)
1] Nomination of Kingswood as a Primary Service Village - I believe it has been over-scored and should actually be a Secondary Service Village.
2] The other listed Primary Villages have significantly more properties and therefore the impact is less e.g potential 39% increase in Kingswood compared to potential 15% in Cubbington
3] 39% more houses in Kingswood is nearly double WDC's own guidelines of 20% baseline growth for Primary Service Villages.
4] School is at capacity; main road is narrow and already congested, and environmental (namely flooding) concerns.

Whilst supporting the need for small scale, sympathetic development that does not change the rural nature of the village, I object to the proposed addition of 100-150 houses in the Kingswood area for the following reasons;

1. An additional 100-150 houses would be too many for the small area of Kingswood that has been designated a category 1 village - the number of additional houses was originally based on the much larger area of Lapworth Parish rather than a small concentrated area which will be massively impacted by such a large development.

2. The lack of public transport in Kingswood means that new residents and their vehicles would create even more congestion on the already busy Station Lane. Children walk to school daily on this road.

3. The increase in residents will also impact the quality of service delivered by the school and local surgery.

1. Object to the fact that the area has been redesignated as Kingswood, which is only a small part of Lapworth, but the number of new houses has gone up from 80-100 to 100-150. How can the area halve in size whilst the number of new houses required go up by 50%?
2. Object to Kingswood being categorised as a Primary Service village. Kingswood has a village shop, 3 pubs, a railway station and a primary school, so the basis for this classification is not transparent at best, and seemingly incorrect. Hatton and Shrewley have similar amenities but have been classified as feeder villages.
3. Object to the fact that comments are being sought on the plan when no indication has been given in the plan of the location of the proposed sites for redevelopment in Kingswood. If a single development of 100-150 new houses is being proposed, then this would completely overwhelm the current infrastructure of the village and be totally disproportionate with the rest of the housing in the area. In addition, the local public transport would not support this size of development as bus services in the area are virtually non-existent and the rail service is only reliable during the morning and evening rush hours.
4. I would support the use of infill between current housing and small developments of up to a maximum of 20 new houses spread throughout the Lapworth area, which would be much more in keeping with previous developments and the existing housing stock.
5. The local primary school has 5 classes for the 6 years at present, so some housing development could be beneficial as it may be able to expand to single class year groups. However, it would be important to ensure that expansion is feasible on the current site, or another site is identified prior to concluding on the plan, and if a decision to expand the school is made, that the school is expanded at the same time that any new houses are built.
6. Publicity on the previous draft of the plan was appalling. I was aware that the local plan was an opportunity to comment on the shape of local amenities over the next 15 years, but proposals for new housing developments was not mentioned at all. I only became aware of this particular aspect of the plan after the consultation had closed on the previous draft, which was over 12 months from the start of the process. Seemingly no effort was made to publicise the plan in rural areas of the district.