Would a new town be safe for our children?

Posted on December 11, 2015December 11, 2015

500m M3 exclusion zone near Winchfield Hampshire

Proposed new town in Winchfield and Hook, Hampshire with 500m exclusion zone around the M3

Many councillors are doing their utmost to promote the supposed benefits of a new town – Hartley Winchook, but it is clear that the plans have not been properly thought through. For instance, what is the impact on the health and well-being of our children?

First let’s take a look at site of the proposed new town in the image above or on this link.

As can be clearly seen the M3 and the railway go straight through the middle of the proposed sites. However, a number of medical studies have been carried out in a number of countries such as the US, Germany and Holland that highlight the dangers to children’s health of living close to major highways such as motorways. Examples can be found here, here and here. The highlighted risks include cardiac and pulmonary risks, wheeziness in children, shorter lifespans, premature births, asthma and cancer. It is worth noting that a new school is proposed just north of site 83 on the map above, meaning the children living in the new town would both live and go to school very close to the motorway. In the light of these studies, Councillor Dr. Anne Crampton has proposed that there should be a 500m exclusion zone for new housing around the M3 (shown in yellow hatching on the map). The implication of this, as can be seen from the map, is that many of the proposed sites would be rendered unsuitable if Dr. Crampton’s proposal was adopted and in fact, the whole new town proposal would fail. So, it seems we have choice: protect our children or concrete over the green fields.

There’s another issue too. The proposed site of the secondary school is between the motorway and the Mildmay Oaks hospital that was housing child sex offenders (one of whom escaped) and other patients who were violent towards staff. Originally, this school site was proposed in the Barratts Vision document that some councillors have since disowned. But, amazingly, this location is still proposed for the secondary school in the site assessments from Hart District Council (HDC) – see image from this document below – Mildmay Oaks is inside the pink blob towards the middle of the image and the boundary for the school is shown in blue.

Potential school next to Mildmay Oaks Hospital Winchfield Hampshire

It is clear that this new town proposal has not been well thought through at all and if this is no longer the proposed site for a school, then the council should say where the school would go. Would it be within the proposed 500m exclusion zone?

It is worth noting also, that if this 500m exclusion zone were applied, it would also reduce the brownfield capacity at Ancells Farm, so we would have to seek out some additional sites and the urban extension at Pale Lane would also be deemed an unsuitable site.

We have created a dedicated consultation page and two guides to responding to the consultation that are available on the downloads below. The comments are designed to be cut and pasted into the boxes provided. It will be very powerful if you could edit the comments into your own words. Please do find time to respond to the consultation and play your part in saving our countryside.

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Responses to Local Plan Consultation

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2 Minute version:

Respond to Local Plan Consultation in 2 minutes

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How developers have gained a stranglehold over Local Plans

Posted on December 9, 2015August 15, 2023

The latest 2012-based government projections of population and the number of households points to a need of around 215,000 dwellings per annum, compared to recent delivery of around 150,000 new dwellings each year. It is clear we need to respond to the objective in the National Planning Policy framework to “boost significantly the supply of housing”. To achieve this, it follows that the sum of all the housing market assessments across the country should add up to the total expected increase in households, or a little more to give some margin of safety.

However, there is increasing evidence that housebuilders have too strong an influence over the process that is leading to housing market assessments being artificially inflated to a level much higher than that required by the national household projections.

By way of example, in Hart, the only consultees outside of the council in the work to produce the Strategic Housing Market Assessment (SHMA) were housebuilders, their representatives and registered providers. The resulting objectively assessed “need” was nearly 50% above the starting point identified by the DCLG’s 2011-based population projections. A series of adjustments were made to the raw forecasts to take account of inward migration to the area, average household size and a near doubling of the historic job creation rate. Many of these adjustments have been shown to be erroneous by the release of the DCLG 2012-based population forecasts that are much lower than those identified in the needs assessment.

The experience of the Hart, Surrey Heath and Rushmoor SHMA is by no means unique. Analysis of five other housing needs assessments of planning authorities across Hampshire, Oxfordshire, Surrey and Berkshire reveals an average housing uplift on the baseline population projections of around 42%.

If this were applied across the whole country, then we would be allocating land and allowing the building of some 305,000 new dwellings each year, far above the national requirement. This goes against latest planning guidance that states that housing need should be “principally understood as a measure of future demand rather than aspiration”. An FOI request has been made to the DCLG to provide the national figures, but this has been refused on the grounds that DCLG “does not hold this information”. Given the importance that is being placed on housing delivery, it is quite staggering that central Government is not monitoring the results of housing needs assessments on a national basis.

As a group of local residents, we looked at the housing needs assessment for Hart and came to the conclusion that many of adjustments and the resulting “need” were inappropriate and challenged the Council. But, as we were lay people and not planning “experts” our views fell on deaf ears. So, we decided to seek the opinion of professional planning consultants to provide an independent challenge to the objectively assessed need. Our experience indicates that many planning consultants are reluctant to get involved in challenging these assessments because they get most of their work from developers and do not wish to bite the hand that feeds them. We approached a number of planning consultants and they either did not reply to us, were conflicted or said they normally act for developers and would be unable to help. Eventually, we found Alan Wenban-Smith.

Once a Local Plan gets to the stage of being examined by the Planning Inspector, the situation gets worse. Because housing needs assessments are usually produced for a combination of planning authorities but Local Plans are examined at the planning authority level, the actual housing need numbers are effectively unchallengeable. The examination focuses on the process for arriving at the housing need and the actual content is immune from challenge. Residents and environmental interests are being crowded out of inspections by the expensive hordes of lawyers, agents and consultants hired by builders and landowners who share an interest in a narrow discussion focused on achieving the maximum possible increase in estimated housing needs.

In effect, the whole process of assessing housing need through to inspecting the resulting Local Plans has been hijacked by the development industry and their narrow interests. This is in direct contravention of the NPPF which states that local people should be empowered to shape their surroundings, with succinct local and neighbourhood plans setting out a positive vision for the future of their area.

The consequence of this is that local planning authorities are being bounced into allocating green field sites for development because they are easier to develop than brownfield sites. This will result in an over-supply of land and lead to land-banking by the developers, who will only build at a rate consistent with maximising their profits. If they supplied new housing at a rate that meant house prices fell, they would immediately reduce output because their business model and in particular the price they pay for land is predicated on steadily increasing house prices. So, in effect we are being asked to allocate too much of our most valuable green field land for housing, but will not actually increase the supply of housing to meet the needs of our neighbourhoods and we leave acres of vacant and derelict brownfield sites.

We need to take action now to remove the stranglehold of developers have on this process, put more power back in the hands of local people and take further measures to mandate the development of brownfield sites and protect our countryside. This might involve increasing the powers of local authorities to compulsorily purchase derelict sites and use the profits to invest in our creaking infrastructure.

We must stiffen the resolve of our local representatives to resist the self-interest of developers and work instead for their electorate. We must also stand up and fight for brownfield only development to protect our countryside from urbanisation. We must vote against a new town.

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Impact of a new town on Fleet and Church Crookham

Posted on December 8, 2015January 2, 2016

Impact of new town on Fleet and Church Crookham

I have a great deal of sympathy for residents of Fleet and Church Crookham who have suffered a great deal of development in recent years with insufficient investment in infrastructure. However, a new town in Winchfield, Hook and Hartley Wintney parishes is not the panacea for Fleet residents that that many of the Hart Councillors would have you believe.
There will be negative impacts in 4 main ways:

Starvation of infrastructure funding
Extra traffic and congestion
Lack of affordable homes
Destruction of amenity space

Infrastructure Funding

Hart Council currently has a £78m infrastructure funding deficit, much of it in Fleet, Church Crookham and Hook. This does not include healthcare where there is a forecast £47m funding deficit in five years time. A new town will need about £300m of infrastructure spending to make it work, but a realistic assessment of developer contributions is £40-50m. This leaves a further gap of ~£250m. There are already complaints about long waiting lists at doctors and lack of other amenities. It is clear that a new town will be under-funded with consequent impact on other parts of Hart District, where there will be no spare money to address the deficit that already exists in all areas of Hart including Fleet and Church Crookham.

Congestion

Where Hart Residents Work, SHMA Figure 13

Let’s have a look at where Hart residents work, using the evidence of the Strategic Housing Market Assessment (SHMA).

A bit less than half of them work in Hart – 45%. So of the 12,500 new people in a new town, 45% of those of working age will work in Hart. The biggest employment centres are in Fleet and Hook. So a significant proportion of the new town workers will go to work in Fleet. They are not all going to work in a new supermarket in the new town.

A significant proportion will also work in Rushmoor (Farnborough and Aldershot), Surrey Heath (Camberley) and Waverley (Farnham) – some 18% in total.

The most obvious travel to work route for many of these people will be along Pale Lane, through Elvetham Heath/Fleet or along Chatter Alley, through Dogmersfield, Crookham Village and Church Crookham. But these roads are narrow and a difficult to upgrade due to bridge constraints, so maybe a new road out of the new town on to Hitches Lane will be required.

A big portion – 6.2%, will use the train to go up to London from a station that is already full, on a line that is operating at or above design capacity.

Another group will go to Hook directly, or through Hook and/or Hartley Wintney to get to Reading or Bracknell adding to existing peak time congestion on the A30.

Pretending a new town will have no impact on congestion in Fleet and the Crookhams is plainly wrong.

Surely much better and more sustainable to direct housing development to the east of Fleet at Ancells Farm, Bramshott Farm and Pyestock (some of them brownfield sites) with a cycle route to Fleet station and a cycle route to the Cody Tech centre or the Farnborough airport complex.

Affordable Housing

Admiral House, Harlington Way, Fleet, Hart District, Hampshire

As of 26/11/15, the cheapest 1-bed and 2-bed new homes available within 1 mile of Fleet are available at prices of £215,000 and £235,000 (Rightmove). Median household incomes for Hart are £40,200 per Figure 4.8 of the SHMA. This means that the cheapest new homes are between 5.3 and 5.8 times median incomes and out of reach for the average household, so something should be done.

The SHMA calls for 60-70% of new build to be 1 and 2-bed properties across the Housing Market Area. The developers are going to want to do what they always do, that is to build 3-5 bedroom detached houses in the new town which will be no doubt attractive to those moving from London, but will do nothing to meet the needs of ordinary people living in Hart.

Surely, it would be better to build smaller, starter properties on brownfield sites such as Ancells Farm, Fleet Road, Harlington Way in Fleet and Bartley Wood in Hook to give younger people a more affordable first step on the housing ladder. This iwll do far more to meet the actual need outlined in the SHMA, and be more sustainable for our environment.

Destruction of amenity space

The Heart of Hart, the area around Winchfield, is used as an amenity area for walking, cycling, watching wildlife and other recreation. Concreting it over and joining together Hartley Wintney, Winchfield and Hook into a giant Hartley Winchook conurbation will lead to lack of amenity for everyone. Hart Council is yet to report on the consultation it ran earlier this year on how we value our amenity space.

If you are concerned about the impact of a new town, we have created two guides to responding to the consultation that are available on the downloads below. The comments are designed to be cut and pasted into the boxes provided. It will be very powerful if you could edit the comments into your own words. Please do find time to respond to the consultation and play your part in saving our countryside.

Full version:

Responses to Local Plan Consultation

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2-minute version:

Respond to Local Plan Consultation in 2 minutes

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New town plan transforms Winchfield into a concrete jungle

Posted on December 6, 2015December 6, 2015

Winchfield SHLAA Sites in Hart District Hampshire

The combination of the sites put forward for the Winchfield new town will put more than half of the beautiful countryside at the Heart of Hart under concrete with devastating impacts on the ecology and environment. But readers should also note that around a quarter of the planned houses will be in Hook parish, with some of it in Hartley Wintney next to the Dilly Lane development, many houses on the boundary with Odiham Parish and of course the eastern boundary of the site will directly abut Fleet and be very close to the Edenbrook estate.

The notion that this is in any way “sustainable development” is total nonsense and the notion that there will be limited impact on other areas of the district is also nonsense.

If you want to protect our countryside you must vote for Approach 1, a dispersal strategy in the Local Plan consultation and ask Hart Council to find again the 1,400 sites they lost. Our remaining needs can be met from brownfield sites alone.

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Do we really want to create a giant Hartley Winchook conurbation?

Posted on December 5, 2015December 10, 2015

Hartley Winchook New Town proposal for Hart District in Hampshire

As you may know, Hart District Council has embarked on a new consultation about the Hart Local Plan. One of the approaches put forward is for a “new settlement at Winchfield”. However, this is misleading because a number of the sites that form part of the proposal are in the Hook and Hartley Wintney parishes. This new town proposal is really a plan to create a single conurbation of Hartley Winchook that will damage the distinct identity if each of the existing settlements.

Moreover, there are also sites in the Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment that further encroach on the parishes of Hartley Wintney and Hook.

Let’s take a look at Hartley Wintney parish first:

Hartley Wintney SHLAA sites in Hart District, Hampshire

As can be seen, many of the proposed new town sites adjoin the Hartley Wintney parish boundary and site SHL 124 actually adjoins what will become phase 2 of the St Mary’s Park Dilly Lane development. Moreover, the pink rectangle that is bisected by the Hart Parish boundary where it adjoins Fleet and Elvetham Heath is the site of a proposed urban extension to the Elvetham Heath community.

Now, let’s take a look at Hook:

Hook SHLAA sites in Hart District, Hampshire

As you can see, sites 126, 136 and 169 already make up part of the proposed new town and they are in the Hook Parish and 1,458 houses are proposed. More than half of SHL167 is also in Hook Parish, delivering a further 400 houses to Hook, giving a total of around 1,850 dwellings. These are very close to sites 1&2 where Hart Council has already resolved to grant planning permission and to sites SHL 3 & 4, which so far have been rejected, but the capacity is between 1,000 and 2,800 houses. It is surely only a matter of time before voracious developers start to lobby for sites 3 and 4 to be included in the package to make the whole thing “more sustainable”, as if concreting over our green fields is in any way sustainable.

The only way to combat this urbanisation of our countryside is to vote for Approach 1, dispersal in the current consultation about the Hart Local Plan, and make comments saying you want Hart Council to find again the brownfield sites they said were “readily quantifiable”.

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Hook facing 1,850 new houses from “Winchfield” new town proposal

Posted on December 4, 2015March 9, 2016

Winchfield and Hook New Town proposal from Hart District Council in Hampshire

Hart District Council’s proposals for a new town in “Winchfield” will in fact lead to another 1,458 houses being built in Hook Parish. This is more than the 730 new homes proposed in the “Urban Extension” approach put forwards in the Local Plan consultation documents.

This apparent paradox arises because three of the proposed sites in the consultation document are sites SHL126, 136 and 169 which are actually in Hook Parish according to the SHLAA documents. The combined total capacity of these sites recorded in the SHLAA is 1,458 units.

[update]

I should also note that more than half of SHL167 – Beggars Corner – is also in Hook Parish, with a total capacity of 772 units according to the SHLAA. This would put a further ~400 or so houses in Hook Parish, bringing the total to around 1,850.

[/update]

The consultation also makes clear that according to Hart DC, (we disagree), that more than one approach will be needed to meet our housing needs. Hook could end up with both urban extensions and a new town partly in their own parish with devastating consequences. In fact from the map, we will end up with a single large conurbation that might end up being called Hartley Winchook.

We urge Hook residents to think carefully about how they cast their votes in the consultation. If they end up voting for a new town as their first preference as suggested by some Hook pressure groups, they may well end up with far more than they bargained for.

In our view, Hook residents would be better voting for a brownfield and dispersal strategy (Approach 1) and adding to pressure to reduce Hart’s housing allocation by challenging the SHMA that is based on out of date Government population projections.

Our guidance for responding to the consultation is available on the download below:

Responses to Local Plan Consultation

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Hart Council doesn’t know how it decided we had 1,800 brownfield sites

Posted on December 1, 2015December 1, 2015

Let's just make up the brownfield numbers

Hart Council admits it made up the numbers

Hart District Council has said that it doesn’t have any back-up to the claim it made in Hart News and at Cabinet that we had capacity for 1,800 dwellings on brownfield land. The implication of this is that it simply made up the numbers, which calls into question whether we can believe any of the numbers the council publishes about the Local Plan.

[update] On September 3, the council said the following in Cabinet papers:

“Active engagement has occurred with local commercial agents to encourage them to inform their clients that residential conversion or redevelopment is a realistic option. This action has undoubtedly increased interest in the potential availability of residential conversion. In this regard it is the Council can reasonably increase potential Local Plan delivery from brownfield sites to over 1,800 dwellings which at this stage can be readily quantified.”

[/update]

Hart also published its estimate in Hart News, see below:

Why we need 3,500 new homes in Hart

We asked:

Please provide an analysis, including SHLAA ref, site name and description, site area in hectares, and expected yield, of the sites that have been used to build up the estimate provided at cabinet on 1 October 2015, when it was asserted that the ‘guesstimated’ capacity for brownfield development in the district up to 2031 was now 1,800 dwellings (up from the 750 dwelling estimate of a year ago and compared to the 2,438 units estimated by WeHeartHart).

How will the recent Government announcement extending permitted development rights indefinitely and allowing automatic planning permission in principle on brownfield sites impact your assessment of brownfield capacity?

Hart has now replied to our FOI request saying:

With regards to the first request, we do not hold that information. The paper on Brownfield Land that went to Cabinet on 3rd September 2015 is available here

With regards to the second request, FOI relates to recorded information held by the Council and not to matters of opinion. We do not hold the information you seek.

We have asked for an internal review of this decision because Hart have apparently lost 1,400 of these homes since September.

There is a brownfield solution to Hart’s housing needs

Posted on November 26, 2015December 16, 2016

Vacant brownfield Block at Ancells Farm, Fleet, Hart District, Hampshire

Vacant Office at Ancells Farm, Fleet, Hampshire

We have done some further analysis on Hart’s Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment (SHLAA) and come to the conclusion that Hart’s housing needs can be met from brownfield sites alone. We believe this is a potentially viable solution that should form part of the forthcoming Housing Options consultation as part of the Local Plan. Instead Hart Council have ignored the wishes of 2,130 people who signed the WeHeartHart petition and only put forward solutions that involve concreting over vast swathes of our countryside.

[Updated 2 March 2016 to add in the new brownfield SHLAA sites as described here]

[Updated 31 March 2016 to include Pyestock (aka Hartland Park)]

[Updated 30 August 2016 to re-set target to 2,350 now that Moulsham Lane, Yateley has been given the go ahead]

So, how have we arrived at our conclusion?

Brownfield sites in the SHLAA

We have been through the SHLAA and identified those sites that are mostly or wholly brownfield in nature, and added up total capacity as recorded in the SHLAA. Pyestock (aka Hartland Park), is now also an official SHLAA site. In total, these sites amount to between 3,208 and 3,250 homes at an average density of a relatively modest 28 dwellings per hectare (dph). The detail is shown in the table below:

Parish	Ref.	Name	Brownfield Capacity in Table 1 in DLP	Site Assessment Capacity (Low)	Site Assessment Capacity (High)	Size (Ha.)	Low Density (dpa)
Blackwater and Hawley	SHL21	Linkwater Cottages, Blackwater		12	12	0.64	18.75
Blackwater and Hawley	SHL100	Sun Park, Guillemont Park North	300	320	320	12	26.66
Bramshill	SHL106	Bramshill (Police Training Centre)		250	250	10	25
Church Crookham	SHL28	26/32 Bowenhurst Road	8	6	6	0.42	14.28
Crookham Village	SHL158	Crondall House, Fleet		27	27	1.13	23.89
Dogmersfield	SHL39	Fermoy, Farnham Road		5	10	2.23	2.24
Dogmersfield	SHL55	Land at Church Lane, Dogmersfield		20	20	0.82	24.39
Elvetham Heath	SHL104	Land at Elvetham Heath	45	45	45	2.25	20
Eversley	SHL127	Land at Paul’s Field, Eversley		70	70	2.8	25
Eversley	SHL140	Land off Warbrook Lane		53	53	1.76	30.11
Ewshot	SHL36	Dachs Lodge, Redfields, Church Crookham		29	29	1.2	24.16
Ewshot	SHL80	Tanglewood, Ewshot		7	7	0.31	22.58
Ewshot	SHL174	Peacocks Nursery Garden Centre		105	105	3.5	30
Ewshot	SHL235	Land at Willow Croft, Church Crookham		50	50	2.75	18.18
Fleet	SHL41	Imac Systems, Fleet	6	6	6	0.05	120
Fleet	SHL42	Camden Walk, Fleet	9	8	8	0.24	33.33
Fleet	SHL50	Waterfront Business Park, Fleet		60	60	1.46	41.09
Fleet	SHL69	18 Church Road, Fleet		10	10	0.07	142.85
Fleet	SHL102	Land at Bramshot Lane		45	45	1.8	25
Fleet	SHL113	Thurlston House	17	12	12	0.68	17.64
Fleet	SHL245	Land at 154-158 Albert Street & Fleet Road	14	8	8	0.18	44.44
Fleet	SHL275	Land at Little Mead, Fleet		12	17	1.06	11.32
Fleet	SHL320	Fleet Town Centre Zone 2	20	150	150	1.8	83.33
Fleet	SHL322	Fleet Town Centre Police Station	17	37	37	0.61	60.65
Fleet	SHL357	Land at Sankey Lane, Fleet		20	20	0.64	31.25
Fleet	TBA	Pyestock (aka Hartland Park)		1,500	1,500	48.2	38.1
Hartley Wintney	SHL95	Nero Brewery, Hartley Wintney		6	6	0.15	40
Hartley Wintney	SHL216	Land adj. to James Farm Cottages, Hartley Wintney		6	6	0.29	20.68
Hook	SHL111	Hook Garden Centre, Reading Road, Nr. Hook		57	57	4.47	12.75
Long Sutton	SHL296	Old Dairy, Long Sutton		5	5	0.2	25
Odiham	SHL29	Land at Butts End		6	6	0.4	15
Odiham	SHL66	Rear garden of 4 Western Lane, Odiham		16	16	0.64	25
Odiham	SHL119	Land at the rear of Longwood, Odiham		9	9	0.31	29.03
South Warnborough	SHL70	Stables at Lees Cottage, South Warnborough		5	5	0.25	20
South Warnborough	SHL172	Granary Court, South Warnborough		16	16	0.69	23.18
Winchfield	SHL34	Land adjoining Winchfield Court		18	25	1.06	16.98
Winchfield	SHL84	Land at Winchfield Lodge		60	60	3.8	15.78
Winchfield	SHL114	Trimmers Cottage, Winchfield Hurst		12	12	0.49	24.48
Church Crookham	SHL81	Vertu, Beacon Hill Road, Church Crookham		65	70	1.76	36.93
Blackwater and Hawley	SHL176	Hawley House, Hawley		8	10	0.3	26.66
Crondall	SHL178	Broden Stables & Stable Yard, Crondall		14	27	1.4	10
Crondall	SHL179	Bowenhurst Lane, Crondall		30	35	1.5	20
Hartley Wintney	SHL189	Land at James Farm, Hartley Wintney		8	8	0.31	25.8
Total				3,208	3,250	117	27.9

A number of these sites are “not currently developable” according to Hart. But most of the green field sites they have put forward are also not currently developable. We believe that the issues surrounding brownfield sites should capable of being resolved more easily than those for green field sites.

Sites not in the SHLAA

There are a number of sites not in the SHLAA that nevertheless should be considered that amount to around 785 additional homes. These include the parts of Ancells Farm, Bartley Wood and Fleet High Street that have not already been permitted or counted elsewhere. We have also counted the complex of under-utilised offices that include Admiral House, Flagship House, Hart Offices and Harlington centre in Fleet. Much of this site was recommended by Fleet Future, but for some reason Hart Council have ignored it. But we can think of no reason why a council that was truly committed to a brownfield first strategy would not offer up its own under-utilised offices to be part of new, mixed use development and move to one of the other vacant office blocks in the district. These sites, with an allowance for parts of sites that have already been permitted, are shown in the table below.

Parish	Site Description	Estimated capacity	Note
Fleet	Admiral House, Flagship House, Hart Offices and Harlington centre	350	Paper by Gareth Price identified 775 units on a larger site incorporating much of this area
Fleet	Ancells Farm	370	From Stonegate report
Fleet	Fleet vacant offices	220	From Stonegate report
Hook	Bartley Wood	200	From Stonegate report
	Less units already granted permission or already counted	-355	Part of Ancells Farm and Barley Wood already granted. SHL 320 already counted
Total		785

Conclusions

Drawing this together, there’s capacity for between 3,993 and 4,035 units on brownfield sites, without increasing the density on any of the SHLAA sites.

Now, according to Hart, we have to find space for a further 2,350 homes (now that 150 houses have been approved at Moulsham Lane, Yateley), according to the current Strategic Housing Market Assessment (SHMA). This shows that we have now more than met our remaining needs from brownfield sites alone. We certainly do not need a new town at Winchfield or any new urban extensions in Hook, Fleet or Elvetham Heath.

However, we also know that Alan Wenban-Smith has challenged the SHMA and said that we need around 2,000 fewer houses. If this were accepted by the inspector, we would have an even bigger surplus of brownfield capacity to take into the next planning period.

We also know that the SHMA is being revised, and the Government has published revised population and household forecasts earlier this year and these showed much lower figures for Hart. Again, this should result in a lower housing allocation, and we would end up with a surplus of brownfield sites until the next planning period.

This begs the question why Hart Council is not including a formal brownfield option in its forthcoming consultation, when that was the clear view of the 2,130 people who signed the WeHeartHart petition. Persisting with new town and urban extension solutions is untenable. Please do get involved with this consultation and respond to it using our guide on our dedicated page about this consultation here.

Bravehart Mascot to We Heart Hart
Bartley Wood Estate in Hook
Bartley Wood Estate in Hook
Derelict Offices on Fleet Road in Fleet, Hampshire
Vacant Office in Ancell's Farm, Fleet, Hampshire
Vacant Block at Ancells Farm, Fleet, Hampshire
Vacant Block at Ancells Farm, Fleet, Hampshire
Development Land in Fleet / Church Crookham, Hart District, Hampshire
Vacant Block in Fleet / Church Crookham, Hart District, Hampshire
Vacant offices in Hook, Hampshire
Vacant block at Ancells Farm, Fleet
Vacant, derelict block in Hook, Hampshire
Vacant Sun Park (Guillemont Park) block near J4A of M3, Hart District, Hampshire
Brownfield site: Hartland Park (Pyestock) near Fleet, Hart District, Hampshire, warehouse development not started
Vacant office in Hook, Hampshire
Vacant office in Hook, Hampshire
Vacant Block at Ancells Farm, Fleet, Hart District, Hampshire
Vacant Office at Ancells Farm, Fleet, Hampshire
Brownfield Land at Pyestock, Hartland Village Hart District, Hampshire.
Development site near Tweseldown, near Fleet/ Church Crookham, Hart District, Hampshire
Brownfield site at Hartland Park, Hartland Village, Pyestock, Hart District, Hampshire
Brownfield site near Crondall, Hart District, Hampshire
Proposals to redevelop Fleet Police station being blocked
Admiral House, Harlington Way, Fleet, Hart District, Hampshire
Future High Streets bid: Fleet Challenges broad and far reaching
Vacant Office Flagship House, Fleet, Hart District, Hampshire
Hart District Council seeks to block brownfield development
Brownfield site: vacant offices at Ancells Farm Business Park, Fleet, Hart District, Hampshire.
Brownfield site: vacant offices at Ancells Farm Business Park, Fleet, Hart District, Hampshire. We Heart Hart. We Love Hart
Brownfield site: vacant offices at Winkworth Business Park, Hart District, Hampshire.
Vacant offices at Murrell Green, Hart District, Hampshire
Brownfield site at Ancells Farm, car park reverting back to heathland.
Brownfield site at Ancells Farm. Hart Council protecting from redevelopment.
Brownfield site at Ancells Farm, Fleet, Hampshire. Hart Council protecting from redevelopment.

What’s changed since 2012?

Posted on November 24, 2015December 2, 2015

Hart in Heart of Hart, Winchfield, Hart District, Hampshire

Hart in the Heart of Hart, Winchfield

Back in 2012, Hart Council issues a press release explaining why it was not going to pursue a new town at Winchfield. Here’s what they said:

A whole set of fresh new studies would need to be commissioned, more land would need to be found, infrastructure needs would have to be assessed, the viability of delivering a new settlement would need to be tested, and above all, the public would have to change its previous views. A new settlement option would need to be supported by a significant groundswell of opinion…. the council believes that residents’ interests are best served by continuing with its current strategy of spreading growth across the district coupled with new and improved infrastructure targeted to serve local communities.

We have to ask what has changed since then?

We have not been told the results of the testing so far, except that infrastructure is going to cost a lot of money (our estimate ~£300m), much of the planned area is covered by SSSIs, SINCs and TPOs, quite a lot of the area is subject to ground water flooding and is close to the M3, which could be damaging to the health of any children living in the new settlement. We also know, a new town would open us up to 3,000 houses from Surrey Heath and Rushmoor.

There is certainly no groundswell of opinion in favour of a new town, other than a cabal of councillors intent on concreting over our green spaces.

So, why is this option even being presented in the forthcoming consultation? Please do get involved with this consultation and respond to it using our guide on our dedicated page about this consultation here.

Hart Council’s new consultation still likely to leave it in a hopeless position

Posted on November 23, 2015August 15, 2023

It seems likely that Hart Council is about to launch a new consultation on housing options for the district as part of the Local Plan. We are following this closely, and will publish some additional materials to help residents make up their mind once the full consultation has been made public.

But having reviewed the materials already on Hart’s website (cabinet meeting materials for 18 November 2015), it seems clear that the council have taken no notice of the legal opinion they received from top QC Peter Village, that described their position as “hopeless”.

That opinion said:

…there is no evidence that to date there has been any consideration by the Council of the “reasonable alternative[s]” of providing less than the OAN, on environmental grounds…

There has been no regulation 18 consultation at all on issues such as employment, retail, transport, infrastructure (or, indeed, anything other than housing distribution). It is inconceivable that a coherent and sound local plan could emerge without addressing most (at least) of these issues. Thus, the Council presently appears to be in a hopeless position if it maintains its current course. Either it will proceed with a plan that does not address fundamental matters (thereby exposing itself on the “soundness” issue), or it will incorporate matters which have indisputably not been the topic of any regulation 18 consultation.

We have been through the consultation materials in some detail, and we can find no reference to the council considering providing fewer houses on environmental grounds, and no sign of consulting us residents on employment, retail, transport or infrastructure.

Coupled with the issues we raised to the council on Friday, it is looking like this consultation is going to be an expensive waste of time and taxpayers’ money because we are still not being offered a proper consultation on all the issues that matter. Please do get involved with this consultation and respond to it using our guide on our dedicated page about this consultation here.