Fears over homes scheme for airfield (From Swindon Advertiser)

When Labour get in at the next election there is a good chance they will implement infrastructure projects to try and boost the economy.

One of the suggestions is large scale building of social housing.

I wonder if these areas identified as potential sites for housing, but without planning permission granted for private development, would be prime sites for the next generation of council estates?

Never understood why there are noise complaints from the site- MORE NOISE FROM THE 419!
Re developments locally, the former st pauls vicarage site was one bungalow, yet thats been knocked down and suddenly its big enough for 5 (five) dwellings. Cant take these concillors seriously re controlling (over) re developments - Can you see why?

Yet another planning calamity from someone with 'Strategic' in his portfolio title. He stated publicly 40-50 which was widely witnessed - now he says up to 100. The Covingham residents he was trying to please will take most of the traffic from this unplanned expansion - let them complain about noise and construction traffic to ........ their local councillor!

Sorry but HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA HA - well local nimby's you complained about the noise. so their going to close it and put houses on ..... DOH !! bet you wish you had all not said nothing. thats has made my day.....

What is wrong with developing Redlands Airfield? It has after all been included in two previous SPDs and was examined by 3 Planning Inspectors as part of the RSS examination in Exeter.

Redlands Farm is a better site for the location of houses than many other sites in Swindon. For one fact it is above the floodplain which much of the Eastern Village Area is not. Redlands is highly suited to creating a new rural village the size of Bourton, Castle Eaton or Sevenhampton. Such a development would be inspiring and somewhere were locals would be proud to neighbour.

Gary Sumner and Andrew Bennett are painting a unrealistic picture of what Redlands could look like. Redlands is highly suited location for a true new rural village close to Swindon. Built with high quality housing designs taking into account local building designs found in many of the Vale villages. These could be landscaped to create be a true new downland village similar to Bishopstone. It could be the location of choose for business people in Swindon, similar to Lydiard Millicent development in the 1980s and Wanborough more recently.

The vision portrayed by Wanborough Parish Council that this will be yet another "Wimpey" type housing estate is totally untrue. Redlands is totally suited to a stand alone new rural village. Wanborough residents can at this stage play a massive part in influencing what this new village will look like.

Upper Wanborough residents currently look over South Marston industrial estate. Redlands could be landscaped to hide both the Eastern Expansion and the Honda plant from the village.

Redlands will still be over a mile from Wanborough village, and Swindon Borough Council have clearly shown a non coalescence protection zone for the land south of Redlands to protect the village.

Swindon's Local Plan will go before a Planning Inspector who will examine the evidence base put in front of him. Wanborough residents should realise that as this was a suitable site to take housing in the RSS days, it is going to be very hard for them to defend.

As said in this article Cole Easdon have stated that the road can take 500 dwellings. This does not mean that the development will be as big as 500 dwellings. It will be of an appropriate size to make the development viable and to create a village community.

Elsewhere in Swindon, Blunsdon and South Marston Parish Council are working with the developers to delivery their visions rather than being against. What is wrong with modern housing estates is that they all look the same. But, the Crown Estate are currently working several new villages where they are looking to obtain planning permission for a new village with a village pond, shop, village green, park area, a mix of housing types to suit all walks of life, the vision for Redlands is should be on similar lines.

Not all new housing has to be ugly, just look around our local villages, the new houses around the village green in Burford, Letcombe Regis Retirement Village, the new homes at Bishopstone and Poundbury are some good examples of what the new village a Redlands could look like.

""StillPav says...
12:27pm Mon 18 Mar 13

One of the suggestions is large scale building of social housing.

I wonder if these areas identified as potential sites for housing, but without planning permission granted for private development, would be prime sites for the next generation of council estates?”""""

Council Housing can only be built with money from the Housing Revenue Account and there isnt any since the tenants voted to take on the extra £70million debt abd associated interest payments on the debt. So that wont happen.

there may be some housing association who may be interested, but wether it would be viable is another matter.

hopefully it will be built as something to be proud of rather than just causing more chaos. As with many things in Swindon, great potential, but will it be realised?

Redlands wasn't included in the local plan consultation in 2011 and only appeared after Cllr Heenan's late intervention. It would be very visible as it does sit on higher ground closer to the AONB than any other housing proposal. I didn't read in the Web Paton document any reference to the Poundbury style of design. It quoted Ridgeway Farm - another piece of farmland to be developed after an appeal (by Taylor Wimpey I think) and a consultant quoting an improved Wanborough Road as capable of taking 500 more homes. This document was clearly maximising the site's potential for the owners. It also mentions using the 5 year land supply as a tool which is being used to push through other unwelcome planning applications.

Eastern Badger, suggest you look a little further back into history about Redlands. Redlands was part of the original Earlsgate proposal in 1996 made by David Wilson Homes. It was also in the EDA area proposed under the South West Regional Spatial Strategy. It has also appeared as being within the developed area under two Supplementary Planning Documents. It was only removed from being in the EVA for part of 2011 and 2012 and was then reinstated within the EVA area in late 2012.

Certain Wanborough residents have made inaccurate assumptions to paint their picture of development on this land without any detailed knowledge of the new rural village concept that is being worked on for this area.

Masterplanning a new village takes a time, when the new village's drawings have been we will present them publicly for comments.

We have no doubt that these drawings will be show a 21st century rural village which will win over many villagers. Please wait and be patient with us, rather than anticipate what this village will look like before seeing what we are working on.

It was re-instated not for sound planning reasons but to shut down a perceived nuisance so lets not build a bigger case than that - even the councillor who insisted on its inclusion will confirm that. Rather than show residents the eventual plans it might be good to find out what's wanted. It's enough that we have to accept 8,000 homes in the countryside without an unspecified additional number which has not been considered in any part of the Eastern Villages planning process. This sort of speculative development which was not part of the master planning is the sort of thing we suffer from all around Swindon. Let's not assume there has been anyone clamouring for more homes closer to the village.

Why do residents always jump to conclusions before seeing the full details?

bobthebulder wrote:
Why do residents always jump to conclusions before seeing the full details?

Because we've seen many developments around Swindon.

Swindon is a national joke because of those previous and continuing developments.

Because many people would not trust Dale Heenan to pee in a pot