North Essex garden communities: consultation on Local Plan document ends this month

Friday, September 20, 2019

We have already reported how plans to build three garden communities in north Essex took a dive when a planning inspector found them “unsound” and needing “significant” further work (see here).
The proposals for West Tey (24,000 homes), West of Braintree (13,000) and East of Colchester (9,000) were contained in a Section 1 Local Plan document put together by Braintree District Council, Colchester Borough Council and Tendring District Council, working on cross-boundary planning issues.
Inspector Roger Clews wrote to the three local authorities in June last year, identifying the aspects of the Section 1 document and its evidence base he considered required significant further work.
Mr Clews laid out the options for the authorities to consider in determining their next steps in the Plan preparations.
They chose to pause the examination and carry out that necessary work on the evidence base and Sustainability Appraisal, and to then bring back their revised proposals for consideration in a resumed Section 1 Local Plan examination.
The three local authorities are now carrying out a public consultation on the Additional Sustainability Appraisal, additional base documents of evidence and the suggested amendments to the Section 1 Local Plan.
The consultation runs until Monday, September 30. Anyone may submit comments, regardless of whether they have previously been involved in the Section 1 Local Plan examination. Those who do can indicate if they wish to take part in further hearing sessions.
Once the public consultation is ended, examination of the Section 1 Local Plan will resume.
If you would like to take part in the consultation, click here