Comment

Representation ID: 40703

Received: 09/08/2021

Respondent: Mr Alan Thorpe

Stage 2 assessment Area AA78 (49 & P45) – comments submitted under Spatial Options consultation
I’ve been a Hockley/Hawkwell resident for over 60 years, living since 1992 in Main Road, Hawkwell - my
bungalow & garden being designated ‘49’ within site AA78, as reviewed in the ‘Stage 2 Assessment’.
I’m writing to endorse strongly the Assessment’s conclusions that:
 AA78 has effectively been subsumed within the inset Hawkwell ‘urban’ settlement as a result of
the large recent adjoining developments built to the N & E of my property;
 the residual green belt boundary has always been confused given adjoining mixed industrial and
horticultural businesses historically falling on the edge of Hawkwell ‘village’. Given recent major
residential developments immediately adjoining AA78, the boundary isn’t now properly
demarcated for green belt purposes by any readily identifiable features;
 adjusting the boundary to follow Main Road itself can create a much clearer and more
defensible border between a consistently developed area to one side and on the other side the
open fields to the S & W of Main Road continuing to provide an effective green belt “buffer”.
Hawkwell can’t be exempt from the continuing need to make future contribution to ongoing targets for
necessary additional housing. I believe that a release for development of the ‘low risk’ area AA78,
presents an opportunity both to address the anomalous boundary position and enable an appropriate
small-scale development that will significantly contribute to meeting Hawkwell’s allocation.
In terms of local infrastructure and traffic, the current vehicle access from the nursery in AA78 onto
Main Road has been in use for many years, and has good sightlines in either direction – certainly much
better than those available to residents on the new Highwell Gardens access. The redevelopment of
AA78 for additional housing may actually result in a reduction in traffic movements compared with the
situation when the nursery was operating at full capacity in the past.
Current site owners (49 & P45)are all keen for any development to be undertaken sympathetically by a
local builder, rather than a national developer, and my understanding is that the nursery owners wish to
retain as their home their more modern bungalow adjacent to ‘Nursery Corner’, together with the
extensive open grassed area which separates the bungalow from the bend. This will means that the
‘rural’ visual aspect of this corner could be sustained, with newly built properties (screened by the
existing trees behind this area to the N&E) adjoining, and blending in with, the much bigger recent
developments already in place.
Looking specifically at my property, there is a particularly anomalous situation arising from recent
planning changes.
My 1920’s built bungalow originally had only 4 rooms, an outside WC and no bathroom as such. Its plot
is large but very long and narrow, with the residence built over 75 metres back from the normal building
line on which almost all bungalows along this side of Main Road sit. It probably formed part of an earlier
family smallholding, where a family member simply chose a preferred location. It still has no mains
sewerage connection, and no current prospect of obtaining up-to-date digital connectivity.
Not until around 1980 was an extension added to provide an inside toilet together with a bathroom and
enlarged kitchen, suitable for modern needs. This effectively used the 25% leeway generally permitted
for extension of green belt properties - I was of course aware of the designated green belt status of my
property when I moved in, but there have been 3 subsequent significant planning changes all of which
combine to significant detriment, in terms of the original ‘amenity’ when I moved in:
 my understanding is that the planning authority would until recently have looked at any
proposed extension/rebuilding of a green belt residence on a case by case basis, with greater
flexibility allowed (e.g. re creating ‘rooms in the roof’) provided that the roof profile and
external dimensions were not made significantly bigger. This of course often facilitated
installation of dormer windows allowing additional bedrooms to meet modern family needs.
RDC Policy was then changed less than 10 years ago to adopt a single parameter for extensions
by just measuring increase to floor space alone – for a bungalow like mine this now rules out the
insertion of dormer windows and I received a formal refusal confirming this point.
 I believe that until the 1990’s the bungalows N of Main Road in the nearby row approaching
Rectory Road (i.e. opposite Potash Nursery) had enjoyed a separate planning regime as part of a
“Rural Settlement” on the periphery of Hawkwell village, with greater planning flexibility
afforded to them. Many of those bungalows are of similar age and original profile to mine, and
almost all have now been significantly extended. This national designation now no longer exists.
 Shortly after I was refused permission re dormers, I learnt that almost over 200 new two storey
houses were to be built immediately adjoining my E boundary. As that new estate was
completed, permission was then also granted for the Brownfield site overlooking my N
boundary for a further 40 2-storey houses. All this building is now completed.
Collectively these three changes have reduced any original ‘green belt amenity’ and effectively blighted
my options going forward. I retired almost 9 years ago and always planned to move on to somewhere
with a much smaller garden within a year or two. While I expected it to be relatively easy to achieve a
market sale - particularly if I’d already secured permission for new owners to extend/rebuild the
bungalow to sustainable standards - in practice the planning obstacles and uncertainties have
continually frustrated such a move. Now approaching 70, I struggle just to keep grass and hedges tidy,
and fear that sooner or later health/age problems may mean that I just watch the bungalow and
outbuildings become more delapidated and the garden quickly totally overgrown.
I know that my neighbours in the adjoining nursery have similar but even more pressing concerns, as I
understand their business, having necessarily been running on a much reduced scale due to health
issues, is imminently to close permanently, with no prospect of anyone taking it on as a going concern.
Again, without a wider planning resolution, their very much larger former working area (and its many
outbuildings) may similarly just become derelict.
Leaving the status quo for AA78 therefore seems to me not only to result in detrimental impact for us as
individual current occupants of properties, but also for Hawkwell residents more generally as the
character of the area deteriorates in the absence of appropriate sustainable development.