Now I can walk my dog through our lovely countryside without having to be constantly thinking to myself "Will this all be going under concrete soon?"
I would also like to offer my thanks and great appreciation to the CAFE team, who have given so much of their time, effort and expertise to make this day possible. I'm sure that all local residents will join me in wishing a thousand blessings on you all!
Now I'm going dog-walking with a lighter heart, then come home and pop a bottle of something fizzy.
Hooyah!!
Thursday 16 July 2009
News and reaction...
Worthing Herald
THE Government's decision to leave Ford off the final shortlist of Eco-Towns has been hailed as a "victory for people power" by Arundel and South Downs MP Nick Herbert. More here...
Littlehampton Gazette
FORD has been left out of the Government's list of Eco-Towns, announced today. Housing Minister John Healey named four sites which he said had passed the Government's tough standards to go through to the next planning phase, full public consultation and local planning approval. More here...
Littlehampton Gazette
ARUN District Council is "delighted" that Ford eco-town will not go ahead. Councillor Graham Tyler was chairman of a select committee established by Arun to look in to bid, which found that Ford was not a suitable location for an eco-town; a decision that was endorsed the full council. More here...
www.clickgreen.org.uk
The Government has today given the green light for four eco-towns, despite strong opposition to the controversial plans. The plans have come in for strong criticism from people who oppose taking the planning process out of the scope of local authorities and the potential reduction in nearby countryside to make way for thousands of new homes. More here...
Telegraph
For a greener Britain, we should build jails, not eco-towns
I know who I'd like to stick in one!
Times Online
Eco towns get green light despite local opposition
&
Analysis: eco towns may not be very green
The Gaurdian
Ecotowns given the go-ahead
Country Life
Government names four eco-town sites
Christian Science Monitor
Britain’s ecotown program runs into NIMBY
THE Government's decision to leave Ford off the final shortlist of Eco-Towns has been hailed as a "victory for people power" by Arundel and South Downs MP Nick Herbert. More here...
Littlehampton Gazette
FORD has been left out of the Government's list of Eco-Towns, announced today. Housing Minister John Healey named four sites which he said had passed the Government's tough standards to go through to the next planning phase, full public consultation and local planning approval. More here...
Littlehampton Gazette
ARUN District Council is "delighted" that Ford eco-town will not go ahead. Councillor Graham Tyler was chairman of a select committee established by Arun to look in to bid, which found that Ford was not a suitable location for an eco-town; a decision that was endorsed the full council. More here...
www.clickgreen.org.uk
The Government has today given the green light for four eco-towns, despite strong opposition to the controversial plans. The plans have come in for strong criticism from people who oppose taking the planning process out of the scope of local authorities and the potential reduction in nearby countryside to make way for thousands of new homes. More here...
Telegraph
For a greener Britain, we should build jails, not eco-towns
I know who I'd like to stick in one!
Times Online
Eco towns get green light despite local opposition
&
Analysis: eco towns may not be very green
The Gaurdian
Ecotowns given the go-ahead
Country Life
Government names four eco-town sites
Christian Science Monitor
Britain’s ecotown program runs into NIMBY
We did it!!!
http://www.communities.gov.uk/documents/planningandbuilding/pdf/pps-ecotowns.pdf
Have read it through very, very quickly and there is no mention I can spot of a 'B list' attached to the Planning Policy Statement. Just Appendix A with the four sites.
I think we can chalk this up as a victory for local protests, marches, meetings, dropping leaflets round in the rain, putting all that effort in to countermand the developers' claims and the government spin.
Well done to everyone involved.
Have read it through very, very quickly and there is no mention I can spot of a 'B list' attached to the Planning Policy Statement. Just Appendix A with the four sites.
I think we can chalk this up as a victory for local protests, marches, meetings, dropping leaflets round in the rain, putting all that effort in to countermand the developers' claims and the government spin.
Well done to everyone involved.
Ford Eco Town abandoned!
Rackheath, Norfolk; north west Bicester, Oxfordshire; Whitehill Bordon, East Hants; and the China Clay Community near St Austell, Cornwall are the only Eco Towns to be built out of a shortlist of 15.
Ford is not on the list - more to come...
Ford is not on the list - more to come...
Locations of eco-towns to be named
The Government is due to announce the locations of a series of environmentally-friendly new towns, with just a few of the shortlisted "eco-town" sites expected to get the go-ahead.
The once-flagship project was intended to meet housing needs and tackle climate change, with as many as 10 settlements built by 2020.
But the scheme has been dogged by controversy and opposition from the Tories, countryside campaigners and local communities, with opponents mounting legal challenges to the selection process. Read more here...
The once-flagship project was intended to meet housing needs and tackle climate change, with as many as 10 settlements built by 2020.
But the scheme has been dogged by controversy and opposition from the Tories, countryside campaigners and local communities, with opponents mounting legal challenges to the selection process. Read more here...
Eco town plan 'to be scaled down'
The government is expected to announce a scaled-down version of its grand plan to create up to 10 "eco towns".
Gordon Brown set out in 2007 to create hundreds of thousands of homes in "carbon neutral" communities as he campaigned to succeed Tony Blair. Read more here...
Gordon Brown set out in 2007 to create hundreds of thousands of homes in "carbon neutral" communities as he campaigned to succeed Tony Blair. Read more here...
Wednesday 15 July 2009
£13,000 to park in an Eco Town
Drivers who want to live in an environmentally friendly "eco-town" will have to pay £13,000 for a parking space, Government documents reveal. The news comes as ministers prepare to unveil the sites for the first ever eco-towns.
Four sites in southern and central England which have received backing from their local councils are likely to go ahead to the planning stage - less than half the 10 eco-towns which were first mooted by Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister, nearly two years ago. Click for more...
Four sites in southern and central England which have received backing from their local councils are likely to go ahead to the planning stage - less than half the 10 eco-towns which were first mooted by Gordon Brown, the Prime Minister, nearly two years ago. Click for more...
Monday 13 July 2009
Sites of first eco-towns to be named as campaigners warn of protest
Rural campaigners have warned of local protests throughout the country after Gordon Brown announces this week that he is to press ahead with his eco-towns project.
On Thursday the Government will finally name three or four sites in the South and South West that have been chosen to proceed in the first tranche of zero-carbon developments.
The Times has learnt that the front-runners are located in four Conservative councils: Whitehill-Bordon, East Hampshire; China Clay Community, St Austell, Cornwall; North Bicester, Cherwell District Council; and Rackheath, Greater Norwich. Each is said to have local authority backing and will therefore have an easier route through the formal planning consultation. Click for more...
Sunday's Observer - announcement this week?
Sunday Observer, 12th July, 2009
Ecotowns to get go-ahead despite local opposition
The projects in Norfolk and Cornwall are part of a green package to tackle the climate change threat
An abandoned Norfolk airfield and a cluster of Cornish china claypit villages are to become the first of a controversial new breed of "ecotowns", offering thousands of new homes built within a cutting-edge eco-friendly community.
The decision will be a blow to villagers who have campaigned against new developments at Rackheath, just outside Norwich, and St Austell in Cornwall. Only Rackheath got a top rating from an independent panel set up to judge the green credentials of the plans, yet it is one of three projects expected to be taken forward by ministers this week.
The ecotowns will form part of a package of green announcements this week which Gordon Brown will argue can help Britain climb out of recession and reduce the threat from climate change. A white paper will propose major changes to the way Britons travel, work and consume in order to meet targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 80% by 2050. Ministers will also set out plans to reduce pollution by investing in rail electrification - leading to faster trains - and in electric cars, as well as exploring new sources of fuel.
Households, however, may face increases of up to £200 a year in energy bills to help fund investment in renewable sources. An overhaul of the social tariff scheme that reduces fuel bills for the poorest is also expected, with an emphasis on spreading the costs of beating global warming so that those on low incomes do not bear an unfair burden.
Writing in the Observer today, Brown admits that adapting to climate change will not be painless but insists it is both necessary and potentially beneficial, by creating jobs in green industries. Ministers will argue that ecotowns offer test-beds for green ideas, from cutting back on car use to growing our own food, that could become standard in all new communities.
However, householders have voiced fears that nearby villages will be swamped and traffic increased: 71% of villagers polled by Rackheath parish council were against an ecotown. The site lies just outside the Norwich North parliamentary seat, where a byelection, triggered by the resignation of Labour MP Ian Gibson, will be held on 23 July. The Green candidate, Rupert Read, has warned that any carbon savings may be wiped out by plans to build a major road through the countryside north of the city to Norwich airport - funded by cash raised from the Rackheath project.
The St Austell site, where the ecohouses would mostly be tacked on to existing villages, has backing from local politicians but the Council for the Protection of Rural England in Cornwall has argued that the plans are "inappropriate". It argues that transport links are sparse and warns the project will be "doomed to failure" unless jobs are created for thousands of new inhabitants.
Brown originally promised to build 10 ecotowns with up to 200,000 carbon-neutral homes, but the 15-strong shortlist has been repeatedly whittled down as several projects withdrew or were hit by the housing slump: the Norfolk site was a late entry last year and not even on the original list for consideration.
Some of the sites have triggered furious local protests, with celebrities from Dame Judi Dench (campaigning against a proposed site in Middle Quinton, Warwickshire) to tennis player Tim Henman's father Anthony (opposing Weston Otmoor in Oxfordshire) spearheading opposition. The project was dealt a further blow by the Department for Communities and Local Government last year in a report that raised serious doubts over the financial viability of several of the shortlisted sites.
In a sign of the government's determination to salvage the scheme, John Healey, the housing minister, will insist that three projects have made the grade and that others could do so in future with more work on their proposals. The first ecotowns are due to be built by 2016 with the rest completed by 2020.
Tomorrow Ed Miliband, the energy and climate change secretary, will officially open south-east England's biggest onshore wind farm, Little Cheyne Court, near Lydd in Kent. Its 26 turbines have a total generating capacity of 60 megawatts, enough to power 30,000 homes.
Ecotowns to get go-ahead despite local opposition
The projects in Norfolk and Cornwall are part of a green package to tackle the climate change threat
An abandoned Norfolk airfield and a cluster of Cornish china claypit villages are to become the first of a controversial new breed of "ecotowns", offering thousands of new homes built within a cutting-edge eco-friendly community.
The decision will be a blow to villagers who have campaigned against new developments at Rackheath, just outside Norwich, and St Austell in Cornwall. Only Rackheath got a top rating from an independent panel set up to judge the green credentials of the plans, yet it is one of three projects expected to be taken forward by ministers this week.
The ecotowns will form part of a package of green announcements this week which Gordon Brown will argue can help Britain climb out of recession and reduce the threat from climate change. A white paper will propose major changes to the way Britons travel, work and consume in order to meet targets to cut greenhouse gas emissions by 80% by 2050. Ministers will also set out plans to reduce pollution by investing in rail electrification - leading to faster trains - and in electric cars, as well as exploring new sources of fuel.
Households, however, may face increases of up to £200 a year in energy bills to help fund investment in renewable sources. An overhaul of the social tariff scheme that reduces fuel bills for the poorest is also expected, with an emphasis on spreading the costs of beating global warming so that those on low incomes do not bear an unfair burden.
Writing in the Observer today, Brown admits that adapting to climate change will not be painless but insists it is both necessary and potentially beneficial, by creating jobs in green industries. Ministers will argue that ecotowns offer test-beds for green ideas, from cutting back on car use to growing our own food, that could become standard in all new communities.
However, householders have voiced fears that nearby villages will be swamped and traffic increased: 71% of villagers polled by Rackheath parish council were against an ecotown. The site lies just outside the Norwich North parliamentary seat, where a byelection, triggered by the resignation of Labour MP Ian Gibson, will be held on 23 July. The Green candidate, Rupert Read, has warned that any carbon savings may be wiped out by plans to build a major road through the countryside north of the city to Norwich airport - funded by cash raised from the Rackheath project.
The St Austell site, where the ecohouses would mostly be tacked on to existing villages, has backing from local politicians but the Council for the Protection of Rural England in Cornwall has argued that the plans are "inappropriate". It argues that transport links are sparse and warns the project will be "doomed to failure" unless jobs are created for thousands of new inhabitants.
Brown originally promised to build 10 ecotowns with up to 200,000 carbon-neutral homes, but the 15-strong shortlist has been repeatedly whittled down as several projects withdrew or were hit by the housing slump: the Norfolk site was a late entry last year and not even on the original list for consideration.
Some of the sites have triggered furious local protests, with celebrities from Dame Judi Dench (campaigning against a proposed site in Middle Quinton, Warwickshire) to tennis player Tim Henman's father Anthony (opposing Weston Otmoor in Oxfordshire) spearheading opposition. The project was dealt a further blow by the Department for Communities and Local Government last year in a report that raised serious doubts over the financial viability of several of the shortlisted sites.
In a sign of the government's determination to salvage the scheme, John Healey, the housing minister, will insist that three projects have made the grade and that others could do so in future with more work on their proposals. The first ecotowns are due to be built by 2016 with the rest completed by 2020.
Tomorrow Ed Miliband, the energy and climate change secretary, will officially open south-east England's biggest onshore wind farm, Little Cheyne Court, near Lydd in Kent. Its 26 turbines have a total generating capacity of 60 megawatts, enough to power 30,000 homes.
Sunday 12 July 2009
High Court challenge to eco-town plans... With fairy cakes?
The controversial bid to build a 5,000-home eco-town on a former airfield is to be challenged in court. Arun District Council is concerned about the Government’s plans for the Ford Airfield site near Arundel.
Chief executive Ian Sumnall has lodged a legal challenge against the plans in the High Court. Arun has already earmarked £20,000 to pay for the legal fees.
The challenge centres around a single word change to the South East Plan where the word “test” was substituted for the word “facilitate” – changing the meaning of the document.
The council is worried that the change, which it says was made without “consultation, explanation or justification”, could mean that eco-towns could be forced on to local authorities without previous testing that has taken place through the council’s own planning document, the Local Development Framework.
The Government’s proposed ecotown scheme would see ten of the new communities built before 2020. The aim is to champion environmentally-friendly lifestyles, carbon-neutrality and energy efficiency. But the councils in each area where the towns have been proposed have objected to the plans.
Now skip jaygee's comments...
Chief executive Ian Sumnall has lodged a legal challenge against the plans in the High Court. Arun has already earmarked £20,000 to pay for the legal fees.
The challenge centres around a single word change to the South East Plan where the word “test” was substituted for the word “facilitate” – changing the meaning of the document.
The council is worried that the change, which it says was made without “consultation, explanation or justification”, could mean that eco-towns could be forced on to local authorities without previous testing that has taken place through the council’s own planning document, the Local Development Framework.
The Government’s proposed ecotown scheme would see ten of the new communities built before 2020. The aim is to champion environmentally-friendly lifestyles, carbon-neutrality and energy efficiency. But the councils in each area where the towns have been proposed have objected to the plans.
Now skip jaygee's comments...
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