Village Clusters Housing Allocations Plan - Reg. 19 Pre-submission Addendum

Support

Representation ID: 4014

Received: 02/10/2024

Respondent: Bennett Homes

Agent: Lanpro Services Ltd

The Site is identified as ‘VC SWA1’ within the South Norfolk VCHAP (Regulation 19) and is located immediately adjacent to the settlement boundary on the eastern side of Swardeston. The Site comprises of 1ha of brownfield land formerly occupied by a plant nursery, with redundant greenhouses and a former farm shop remaining on the Site. Only minor amendments are proposed to paragraph 6.16, the pre-amble to Policy VC SWA1. These minor amendments are not considered to have a material bearing on the interpretation of Policy VC SWA1.

Bennett Homes continues to support the allocation of VC SWA1 for residential development. Lanpro, on behalf of Bennett Homes, has previously submitted representations in relation to Policy VC SWA1 during the earlier Alternative Sites & Focused Changes (Regulation 18) consultation. As part of these representations, Bennett Homes promoted the allocation of an additional 0.6ha of land to enable the delivery of an additional 10 residential dwellings at the Site. Please see the attached letter at Appendix 1 for full details of this representation. For the reasons set out in this previous representation, Bennett Homes maintains that Policy VC SWA1 should be extended to include the additional 0.6ha and uplift the number of dwellings allocated through this policy from 20 to 30. This suggested increase in site area and number of dwellings is supported by the consultation on amendments to the NPPF which commenced on 2 August 2024 and closed on 24th September 2024.

This consultation seeks to amend the standard method for calculating housing supply, the effect of which would be to increase the annual housing requirement over the Greater Norwich Local Plan area from 1,929 to 2,647 dwellings per annum. Allocating additional housing to support this increased housing requirement would be consistent with the objective of the NPPF (both in its adopted and current consultation) in seeking to significantly boost the supply of homes and delivering a sufficient amount and variety of land where it is needed. Such an amendment would assist in achieving a plan which has been positively prepared, justified, effective and consistent with national policy and therefore ‘sound’.

Support

Representation ID: 4015

Received: 02/10/2024

Respondent: Bennett Homes

Agent: Lanpro Services Ltd

The Site is identified as ‘VC SWA2REV’ within the South Norfolk VCHAP (Regulation 19) and is located to the south-east of the junction between Main Road and Gowthorpe Lane, Swardeston. The Site comprises of agricultural land and is subject to planning application 2023/0908 (made by Bennett Homes) for full planning permission for a development of 43 new dwellings and associated external works.

The proposed amendments include significant changes to paragraph 6.21-6.27 which provide the context to Policy VC SWA2REV. The policy wording is then amended, amongst other changes, to alter the number of dwellings that the site is allocated for from ‘approximately 30 dwellings’ to ‘approximately 40 dwellings’.

Bennett Homes fully supports the uplift in dwellings from approximately 30 to 40, and considers that the allocation of the Site supports the principle of application 2023/0908 which Bennett Homes are anticipating will be heard at Planning Committee in Autumn 2024 with an officer recommendation of approval.

Notwithstanding this support for Policy VC SWA2REV as amended through this current consultation, Bennett Homes maintain that the submitted application for 43 dwellings would have been acceptable under previous iterations of this policy and that the effect of the proposed amendment to Policy VC SWA2REV would not result in any increase in actual housing numbers in Swardeston (as these would have been delivered regardless of the proposed amendment). This provides further justification for increasing the number of dwellings from 20 to 30 on Policy VC SWA1 as outlined above on the basis that this would represent an actual increase in the number of homes that the VCHAAP would deliver.

Bennett Homes also note that the Policy VC SWA2REV requires “The provision of a 2.0m wide footway along the site frontage…” (my emphasis). The site has a frontage with both Main Road and Gowthorpe Lane, but the provision of a footpath on the latter would not be necessary to facilitate the development of the Site. Accordingly, Bennett Homes suggest that the first bullet point is amended to read:

“The provision of a 2.0m wide footway along the site frontage with Main Road…”