Hartley Wintney Neighbourhood Plan launched for consultation

Hartley Wintney Neighbourhood Plan launched for consultation

The Hartley Wintney Neighbourhood Plan team have launched the latest version for consultation. It is clear that a great deal of work has gone into this plan, so we should thank the team. I would encourage Hartley Wintney residents to respond to it positively.

The consultation runs from 9am on the 8^th January to 9am on the 19^th February 2018. Copies of the summary and full versions of the Neighbourhood plan can be found here. The online feedback form can be found here.

Our feedback has broadly welcomed the Neighbourhood Plan. However, we have made three recommendations for improvement that you may wish to consider in your own submission.

Hartley Wintney Neighbourhood Plan Improvements

Policy 7 Views. As you may know the Hart Local Plan is due to be published for consultation shortly. This contains Policy SS3 which includes proposals for a new town in an area of search including Murrell Green. I believe you should expand the field of the protected view coming from the West of the village to include the vista to the south of the A30. This might afford us some greater protection later down the line if we are unsuccessful in fending off the new town.

Policy 8 Gaps. Related to the above, the Hart Local plan defines a number of strategic gaps around the district. These are shown as red hashing on the image below.

Hartley Winchook leads to no strategic gaps around Hartley Wintney nor to the east of Hook

It is notable that there are no strategic gaps proposed by Hart around Hartley Wintney. I would suggest that in the absence of such gaps being proposed by HDC, then we as a village should propose our own strategic gaps, particularly to protect against visual and physical coalescence with Murrell Green/Hook to the south west and Elvetham Heath/Pale Lane/Fleet to the south east.

Village Parking. My final comment relates to parking in the village and along Green Lane in particular. The village has grown a lot in recent years, and the infrastructure has not grown with it. There are times of the day that Green Lane becomes impassable due to cars being parked and other cars wishing to travel in both directions along it. There is probably scope to widen the lane between the Church and the WI Hut to allow both parking and two-way traffic. Similarly, there is probably scope to add extra parking spaces along Church Lane between Fleet Road and Oakwood school. Extra parking capacity will help those people who need to drive to work in the village.

Please take the time to examine the document to come up with your own suggestions for the Hartley Wintney Neighbourhood Plan.