Will Dani King Save Lib Dems' Cycle Strategy?

Announcing the Dani King cycleway to honour the Hamble cyclist's Olympic gold medal, Hedge End Town and Borough Councillor (and Hamble County Councillor) Keith House claimed “The Council is committed to investing in opportunities for all its residents to enjoy sport and active lifestyles, at a time when many other councils are cutting back and I hope that as many people as possible will be inspired to use the new Dani King Cycleway.”

The cycleway (which will run for 3.5km along Hamble Lane) is an appropriate and imaginative way to mark King's achievement and might give the Lib Dems' cycling strategy a much-needed boost.  

Eastleigh has had a strategy (on paper at least) to encourage cycling in the Borough since 1990, but according to a recently published Department of Transport survey, the Lib Dems have failed spectacularly to encourage cycling in the Borough. 

Along with the Isle of Wight, Eastleigh is bottom of the league table of Hampshire councils for encouraging cycling, with only 13% of residents claiming to get on their bikes at least once a month, and only 2% cycling regularly at five times a week.

Local Authority	1 x per month	1 x per week	3 x per week	5 x per week
Gosport	32	24	15	8
New Forest	24	15	7	4
Hart	24	14	7	7
Test Valley	22	13	5	3
Havant	21	13	9	6
Winchester	21	13	5	3
Portsmouth	20	14	8	5
Rushmoor	19	14	8	4
Basingstoke and Deane	18	13	7	4
Fareham	18	10	4	3
East Hampshire	16	9	3	2
Southampton	14	10	4	3
Isle of Wight	13	8	3	2
Eastleigh	13	8	3	2

Eastleigh has 44km of cycle routes, many of them in Hedge End, but people don't seem to want to use them.  Perhaps they have been built where they are easy to build, not where they would be really useful to people wanting to cycle as part of their day to day lives or where they would make cycling genuinely safer.

Perhaps it would help if the Council got on with the long-awaited Hedge End to Botley cycleway.

 

Late Night Pizzas Latest

Southampton City Council to Decide 

Following my report last week about Domino's Pizzas plans to stay open into the early hours of the morning seven days a week, all Hedge End town councillors have been advised that the Highways and Planning committee will have a chance to discuss the issue on Wednesday 5th September.

It doesn't appear on the agenda, but will be raised as an item of correspondence.  Hedge End Town Council can object to or support the license application, but the decision will be made by the licensing team at Southampton City Council. 

Despite their claims not to have cut any services, the Lib Dems at Eastleigh have, in fact, closed down the Borough's own licensing team and transferred the responsibility to Southampton, retaining just an email address at Eastleigh.

Town councillors are advised that Eastleigh Borough Council's planning enforcement team will be writing to Southampton City Council to object to the license application on the grounds that it contravenes the condition imposed by the planning inspector to limit opening to 9:00-23:00.

Interested residents can make representations to liquor.licence@eastleigh.gov.uk - objections should fall into one of these categories:

The prevention of Crime and Disorder

Public Safety

Prevention of Public Nuisance

Protection of Children from Harm

H&P on Wednesday will also be considering the pre-consultation draft of the Borough's local plan:
Hedge End's Future - A Lib Dem Concrete Jungle (part 1)
Hedge End's Future - A Lib Dem Concrete Jungle (part 2)

Southampton Civic Centre photo credit: Andrew McDonald

Local Plan Debate (3): Lib Dem Strategy Makes Plan Unsound

Eastleigh Planners have been working on the Lib Dems' new Local Plan for 3,500 new houses in Hedge End and Botley for years according to Hedge End Town Councillor and Leader of the Borough Council Keith House.  Yet the official  report recommending the Plan to Council last month was not exactly effusive in its conclusions:

According to the report (paragraph 50), the local plan must be ‘sound’, and to be sound, a plan must be:

• Positively prepared - it must meet objectively assessed development requirements

• Justified – it must be the most appropriate strategy, considered against reasonable alternatives

• Effective – it must be deliverable over the plan period

• Consistent with national policy – it must enable the delivery of sustainable development

The report goes on to say (paragraph 51):

"Meeting these requirements in the context of the Council’s preferred strategy and the defined programme for the plan preparation process has been challenging. The process is not without its risks and the proposals will, inevitably, be subject to continuing objections, but I believe that the presubmission draft of the Eastleigh Borough Local Plan 2011 – 2029 attached to this report provides a clear, deliverable framework of  proposals and policies for meeting the borough’s development needs and for managing development pressures over the plan period."

According to the report, the Plan is "clear and deliverable", but it does not state that it is positively prepared, justified or consistent with national policy.

Surely if the plan did meet "objectively assessed development requirements" the report would say so.

Similarly why not trumpet the fact, if the plan was the "most appropriate strategy considered against reasonable alternatives"?

If it would "enable the delivery of sustainable development", you'd have thought the planners would be congratulating themselves, not passing it over in silence.

It seems that according to the Borough's own planners, the plan only meets one of the four success criteria for a "sound" plan.  And that is because it is based on the Lib Dems' flawed strategy of building at Woodhouse Lane and at South Stoneham at all costs.

The "presubmission draft" of the plan is open for consultation until 12th October.

The Domino Effect: Late Night Pizza Parties in Hedge End?

A Domino's Juggernaut 

To the shock and surprise of residents near Hedge End's St John's Centre, Domino's Pizza is planning to stay open until three in the morning seven days a week, and has applied to Eastleigh Borough Council for a licence to do so.
 
When Domino's applied for planning permission in 2010, they were turned down by the Council who wanted to preserve a higher proportion of retail premises in the centre of Hedge End.  That decision was overturned by the central Government inspector, but with the condition that "The use hereby permitted shall not undertake any cooking or be open to customers outside the hours 09:00 to 23:00 on any day."

They are now seeking to undermine that condition, not via the planning system, but through licensing.  They are also doing it in August, a favourite month to sneak through unpopular changes as most people are thinking about summer holidays and not scanning the public notices sections of newspapers or council web sites.

Let's hope the council licensing team take into account that the centre of Hedge End is a residential area with children who have to get up for school, and with people who have to get up for work in the morning.  They don't want the noise of delivery motorbikes and cars, or gangs of people on their way home from pubs and clubs hanging around buying pizza until three in the morning.

People wishing to support or object to the licence application have until 7th September to do so in writing.

Details of how to object are on the Council's web site: here.

The reference number for the licence application is 2012/00394/05EPRN.

The Eastleigh branch of Domino's has applied for a similar licence.

Local Plan Debate (2): Who Can You Believe?

Doomed Countryside? 

Can Eastleigh Lib Dems actually deliver their plan for a thousand houses at Woodhouse Lane?

Last month's Borough Council meeting which saw the Lib Dem's Local Plan for Eastleigh bulldozed through with a massive majority was remarkable for the succession of Conservative speakers, both from the public gallery and in the council chamber, who insisted that the plan is not deliverable because Tory controlled Hampshire County Council will not release the land at Woodhouse Lane (which is currently leased to farmers) for housing.

Even 2010  parliamentary candidate Maria Hutchings had a statement read out on her behalf which is reproduced here.  A representative of Botley Conservatives said it.  Cllr Judith Grajewski (Hiltingbury West) said it.  There is even a letter from Cllr Ken Thornber which says it.  The Tories will not - apparently - sell the land that the Lib Dems want so desperately to build on.

The Lib Dems claim that the Thornber letter is only stating a personal view and is not representative of County Council policy.  Hedge End Town Councillor Louise Bloom claimed that minutes of internal meetings prove that Cllr Thornber is wrong.

According to an Eastleigh officer's report to cabinet the Eastleigh plan is "deliverable" (paragraph 51 in this document), so the planners at the Civic Offices agree with the political administration that Cllr Thornber's opinion as leader of the County Council carries no weight.

Broken Promise in 2011

Who To Believe?

Bearing in mind that we are less than a year from elections for the County Council, claims by either party need to be treated with some scepticism.  The Lib Dems have already made election promises they knew they would not keep.  Hedge End Town Councillor Keith House, in introducing the Plan to Council last month, admitted he had been working on it for six years.  Yet Hedge End Lib Dems promised in both 2011 and 2012 that they would "stand up against more building and traffic in our area" at the same time as they were working on a plan for increased building and traffic in Hedge End and Botley.  Only Botley councillors have broken ranks with the Lib Dem leadership and voted against the plan.

Only Cllr Kyrle has kept this 2012 promise

And the Conservative and Lib Dem Coalition Government is desperate for local authorities to give up land for housing.  Can even Ken Thornber resist the weight of Eric Pickles and his party's national policy?

Walk The Walk?

Cllr John Caldwell (Conservative, Hiltingbury East) claimed in the Council debate that only representations made in the final stage of the Local Plan consultation would be made available to the inspector who has to approve the plan.

If that is the case, then it is up to the Tories to prove to the Inspector that the land at Woodhouse Lane will not be sold for housing.  This would make the Lib Dems' plan not achievable and force them back to the drawing board.

Consultation on the Pre-Submission Draft of the Local Plan runs from 17th August to 12th October.

Lib Dem Leaflet Out of Date and Unreliable

Wildern Mill:  Derelict and Dangerous 

The Daily Echo reports on Wednesday that the proposed new development at the derelict Wildern Mill brown field site will bring 400 jobs and 50 new houses to Hedge End.

Don't forget that the news was here first on Hedge End Blogger:  Wildern Mill "Next" Step Leaves Lib Dems with a Dilemma on 31st July and Wildern Mill: Another U Turn in Prospect on 12th July.

Lib Dems Actually Out of Touch with New Plans

New jobs are welcome, although it is in the nature of retail employment that not all those jobs will be full time, and as the new Next store will be replacing the existing furniture warehouse, some jobs will inevitably be lost as well.

Local Lib Dems, with their reliance on paper newsletters, are struggling to keep up even with this not particularly fast-moving news story.  A "Standpoint" being delivered in Hedge End this week claims that "Eastleigh Borough Council's Local Plan for the area promotes employment use on the site, accessed only from Charles Watts Way".

Alas for Cllrs Keith House and Rupert Kyrle who are pictured claiming credit for these "new proposals", events have moved on, and the policy referred to has been removed from the latest version of the Local Plan, on which consultation is due to start on 17th August.

What we in fact have is a mixed-use proposal with access from both Charles Watts Way and Turnpike Way, which has originated from the landowners, and not the Lib Dems.

With the Lib Dem Standpoint out of date and unreliable, the current proposals can be seen at wildernmill.co.uk.

Local Plan Debate (1): Mayor Breaks Ranks

Cllr Kyrle said No but Cllr Welsh said Yes 

Lib Dem keeps election promise!

The only Hedge End councillor to oppose the Lib Dem bulldozer and vote against the Pre-Submission Draft of the Eastleigh Local Plan was the multi-tasking Hedge End Town Councillor, Botley Parish Councillor, Botley Borough Councillor, County Councillor, Head of Chris Huhne MP's Office and Mayor of Eastleigh,  Rupert Kyrle.

Unlike other "dual-hatted" Lib Dem town councillors who also represent Hamble, Bursledon (Cllr House), and West End (Cllrs Clarke and Tennent), parishes which are being asked to sacrifice less than their fair share of green fields to the developers, Cllr Kyrle's only elected power base is in Hedge End and Botley.

With County Council elections next year, it would have been suicidal for the Lib Dems to have the County Councillor for Botley and Hedge End vote in favour of 3,500 new houses in his patch. 

Rupert has spoken against the Plan on several occasions, but his voting against the Lib Dem majority at full council does raise the question why Hedge End's Borough Councillors did not take the opportunity to vote with him and keep their recent election promises.

Broken Election Promise 2011

Cllrs Jenny Hughes, Derek Pretty, Jane Welsh and Mick Wheatley have all been elected on promises to "Save our Countryside", and "Stand up Against more Building and Traffic" in the last two years, yet along with Cllr Peter Hughes, they dutifuly trooped in behind Lib Dem leader Keith House and fellow cabinet member Louise Bloom to vote for a plan which does just the opposite for Hedge End.

It was particularly irritating for Hedge End residents in the public gallery that a succession of Lib Dem councillors from Bursledon, Fair Oak, Horton Heath and  West End spoke praising the Plan which protects green fields in their areas from development but not a single Hedge End councillor spoke up for the green fields of Hedge End and Botley.

As both Botley councillors were allowed to break ranks and vote against the Lib Dems' plans, electors in Hedge End will be asking themselves why their councillors failed to join them and merrily voted in favour of more building and traffic in our area.