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Gloucester Centre Redevelopment (Objection) G#28968

By 4 October 2019March 28th, 2020Buildings, Case Study, Objection, Projects
Gloucester Centre FaceBook, GBE Objection (Navigation) G#38274, Gloucester Centre Demolition (Objection) G#38285

Gloucester Centre Redevelopment Objection

GBE > Projects > Buildings > Case Studies > Objection > G#28968

Gloucester Centre Redevelopment Objection
About: 

Project Objection:

  • This is a case study of an Outline Planning Application objection by residents
  • It is recorded here to help other residents understand the process of objecting to a Planning Application
  • GBE have include documents and templates that can be edited and made specific to other sites
  • We do not yet know the outcome but will update this page as it happens

Project context:

  • Still reeling from the 2008 stock market cash and subsequent bailout of the financial institution ‘gambling houses’.
  • UK Government has been selling off all of its land and building assets.
  • Homes England (Government Department) is managing this process.
  • They have engaged Land Agents and Designers to make proposals for development on all of those pieces of land and seek Outline Planning Approval.
  • These proposals are intended to ‘de-risk’ the sites to make the land attractive to developers.
  • Effectively helping the developers to maintain their stranglehold on supply of housing at a pace that maintains their obscene profit margins and carry on with their business as usual.
  • This site is one of the less attractive ‘risky’ sites and in order to sell it, it was bundled with an attractive and lucrative site in Cambridge.
  • Its risks, compared with a greenfield site, include:
    • Brownfield site (prior use),
    • Needs Planning change of use from Health Care to Residential
    • Occupied by NHS Care Home,
    • Buildings to refurbish or demolish,
    • Single storey precedent,
    • Bat roots in numerous buildings,
    • 67 mature trees,
    • Access restricted by redirecting vehicles through residential streets,
    • Surrounded by residents who are likely to object to proposals

Project Case Study

  • Project: Gloucester Centre Redevelopment Peterborough
  • Proposal:
    • Demolish 40+ year old NHS Care Centre
      • many of which are redundant and occupied by bat roosts
      • Interfering with bats and roots is illegal
      • Obtaining a licence first means they can do what is illegal, legally
    • Clear fell 67 forty plus year old trees
      • Trees include Bat Foraging sites (Bats are protected species)
      • The trees are all perfectly healthy and would add character to a new site
    • Build 100 new homes
      • Public Services in the area are oversubscribed and cannot accept any more people
      • Schools in the area are at capacity and cannot accept anymore pupils
      • Numerous other housing sites are being proposed nearby exacerbating these problems
    • Divert all new 200+ cars from industrial estate access to residential estate access
      • 6 different rat-runs exist through this residential estate, drivers trying to shortcut the gridlock
      • The existing infrastructure is inadequate for the existing traffic loads
      • Rush hour gridlock is common place in the surrounding streets
      • A 2 mile route to work can take an hour in a car
      • Adding more residential sites will only exacerbate the problems
      • Insufficient local schools capacity means the new sites will generate more longer car journeys to more remote parts of the city

Important precedents

  • Peterborough claims to be “Environment Capital”
  • Peterborough City Council (PCC) has numerous Environmental and Biodiversity Policies
  • Peterborough Environment City Trust (PECT) expressed concern that PCC had not yet Declared
  • PCC has now Declared to the Climate Emergency Campaign on Carbon reduction and Biodiversity protection
  • PCC has adopted a Doubling of Biodiversity policy replacing existing policies

GBE Quotes

  • “Aspire to become, what you desire to appear”

Facebook Group Page

Campaign Email Account

  • Not everybody is on facebook, so another means to keep residents informed
  • Gloucester Centre Development Action Group: 6-8 active members
  • gcdactiongrp@outlook.com
  • A dozen resident’s, not on face book, email addresses

Development Public Display

  • Held in Community centre remote from site in question
  • No Public Consultation, just display of intention
  • Representatives did not know the scheme, so could not answer residents questions
  • Leaflets ran out rapidly, so many residents had nothing to take away
  • Leaflets showed the existing not the proposed
  • The Proposed was on display
  • Feedback forms for residents to email or post
  • Pinterest Section Public Display

Residents notes after Public Display

Local Parish Council Meeting Residents Presentation & Notes

Residents House to House calls Notes

  • We visited all the surrounding estate streets and knocked on all doors, approximately 500.
  • We informed residents and asked for their comments and recorded them.
  • We have a very unbalanced infrastructure, due to the wonderful fast dual carriageway ‘parkways’ delivering many cars in rush hour to a wholly inadequate Oundle road, we get grid-lock and cars backing up onto the ‘parkways’ beyond the previous junction.
  • In doing so we discovered that there are actually 6 different rush-hour rat-runs criss-crossing the estate affecting all roads except cul-de-sacs.
  • Adding 100 more houses and their 200+ cars and directing them all through an already congested residential estate would just put so many more at risk:
    • School pupil cyclists, pedestrians young and old, parked vehicles.
  • See all the comments:
  • Gloucester Centre Site A08BRM230619 Residents Feedback PDF

Leaflet posted in House to House cals

  • We took leaflets and handed them to residents or posted them if there was no answer
  • Informing them of the facebook group, email address and PCC planning website and pending planning application
  • Gloucester Centre Redevelopment Flyer A5 Black PDF

Public Display Objection Letters

  • Orton Longueville Parish Council’s letter (permission being sought)
  • Savills (Land Agent) response (permission being sought)

Site Photographic Survey

Biodiversity observation by Residents

Public meeting

Revised Plans

Outline Planning Application (OPA)

Newspaper Coverage

https://www.peterboroughtoday.co.uk/news/politics/objections-to-homes-plans-on-peterborough-health-site-1-9088220

Residents ‘Call-in’ Application

  • To ensure the application is not approved by the planning officer without public consultation, the application must be ‘called-in’,
  • With the Parish Council’s advice, residents were encouraged to write to Parish Councillors, Ward Councillors, City Councillors, Local MP to ask them to ‘Call-in’ the application.
  • The Parish Council gave us the right words and some contact names and positions
  • We turned this into a template for the residents to add their own concerns and we searched for and recorded all the contact details emails and addresses, so nobody else had to do the same searches
  • Template to copy and edit for any other site:
  • Gloucester Centre Development Call In Template PDF

Residents Objection Poster Campaign

  • We have 121 members of the facebook group
  • We have a dozen other resident email addresses
  • There are 500 homes affected by this application
  • To be sure we inform most residents:
  • 15 or so posters were strategically placed for passing cars, pedestrians and cyclists
  • Gloucester Centre A3 Objection Poster PDF
  • Guerrilla poster tactics were used to post more at night!
  • Running repairs were needed during extreme windy weather

Residents Planning Objections

  • Go to Planning Portal to the Application
  • Other tabs include residents feedback
  • Well over 100 comments/objections were posted by residents
  • We still need more.

GBE Objection 1

  • Environment Capital – Greenwash?
  • Aspire to become, what you desire to appear.
  • Doubling Biodiversity is not achieved by cutting down 67 mature trees and destroying their supported flora and fauna.
  • Every little counts
  • Environment Agency: Every little action by many adds up to a lot.
  • Destroying bat roots is illegal, unlimited fines and imprisonment are on offer.
  • Getting a licence first to destroy bat roots, might be legal
  • But its still wrong.
  • You have a duty of care in your role in Development Control.
  • Hold yourself personally accountable for your actions.
  • Aspire to become what you desire to appear
  • Environment Capital – Greenwash?

Critique of OPA Documents

Building for Life 12

Residents Presentation at Planning meeting

  • There is a 5 minute slot for a resident’s representative to speak, it needs to be well prepared, comprehensive, succinct and only address planning matters
  • One of the residents is on the Planning Committee
  • To avoid being seen as having a vested interest in rejecting the scheme that resident is temporarily standing down from that role.
  • That person will now speak on behalf of the residents at the planning meeting.
  • Residents will be permitted to attend, but not speak.

OPA Outcome Pending

  • They are thinking about it and PCC T&CP have met wth the developing agencies to discuss residents feedback

A Diversion

  • A separate full planning application has been submitted for the Bat Barn and additional Bat Box Posts
  • We have prepared feedback, awaiting community feedback
  • We will submit in due course.

Reserved matters Pending

Full Planning Application Pending

© GBE NGS ASWS Brian Murphy aka BrianSpecMan *
4th October 2019 – 23rd March 2020

Gloucester Centre Redevelopment Objection
Images:

FaceBook Group Page

Gloucester Centre FaceBook

Gloucester Centre Residents FaceBook Page

Project

Development Public Displays

Leaflet Posting

Gloucester Centre Site A5 flyer

Residents Tree Survey

Residents Wildlife Survey

Development Outline Planning Application

Residents critique of Outline Planning Application

Gloucester Centre Site BuildingForLife12 A02BRM051019 PNG

Resident Objection A3 Poster  Campaign

Gloucester Centre A3 Objection Poster

© GBE NGS ASWS Brian Murphy aka BrianSpecMan *
4th October 2019 – 6th October 2019

Gloucester Centre Redevelopment Objection
See Also: 

GBE Case Studies

GBE Building Case Studies

GBE Case Study Objections

  • Gloucester Centre Development (Objection) G#28968 (this page)
  • Bat Barn and Bat Box Posts (Objection) G#38145
  • Phased demolition of NHS Hospital (Objection) G#____ 

GBE Information

  • National Policy Framework
  • Local Plan
  • Local Plan Improvement Campaign
  • Climate Emergency Declaration
  • Climate Emergency Response

GBE Jargon Buster

© GBE NGS ASWS Brian Murphy aka BrianSpecMan *
4th October 2019 – 28th March 2020

Gloucester Centre Redevelopment Objection END

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