Planning applications could be approved automatically under new ‘snooze you lose’ plans.
Some developers wanting to build in some areas of the country are waiting, on average, more than 12 months for a decision on planning applications.
Although ‘Your Waverley’ has ramped up its performance on planning decisions and avoided going into “Special Measures”, is it stalling a scheme that has received approval by a Government Inspector at appeal?
Despite repeated attempts to forge ahead with its scheme to build 99 homes on land in Alfold adjacent to the Petrol Station, Vistry Homes, part of The Bovis Group, is in a vacuum. While Waverley sleeps, or WFH, Vistry wants to get shovels in the ground to build the homes the country needs.
It has been trying for seven months to get Waverley Planning Officers off their backsides to approve its detailed final plans for the scheme with access off the A281 Horsham/Guildford Road near Alfold Crossways.
Could it be stalling because developers are currently swarming all over the village? Odd, though, Thakeham’s planning appeal went to appeal after the Vistry scheme but was dealt with by the Government first and is now well underway. Whilst Vistry’s detailed scheme still languishes in the bowels of Waverley Towers awaiting the off signal.
New data shows planning consent for new homes across the country has fallen to a record low.
In the 12 months to the end of September 2023, 2,778 developments across Britain were granted planning permission – two per cent fewer than the number approved in the 12 months to the end of June and 20 per cent fewer than in the same period last year.
Developers have warned that new housing supplies next year could drop below 200,000, the lowest figure in a decade.
Stewart Baseley, executive chairman at the Home Builders Federation, said:
“This is the inevitable outcome of several years of anti-growth policy and rhetoric. Businesses have warned for some time that the impact of Government action would be severe but now there is now a mounting body of evidence.
If ministers continue with the proposals to rid the planning system of targets and consequences, no matter how it is packaged, it will result in fewer new homes and represents another victory for NIMBY backbenchers.”
The Government, in its 2019 election manifesto, set a target of building 300,000 homes every year by the middle of the mid-2020s
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If the planners at Waverley have been rushing to meet the government targets they will have been prioritising the quick and easy applications to get the numbers up. It would be nice to think that there are still some senior planners there who could take on the more complex work.
Hi WW
The COUNTRY May need more Housing, Waverley needs more Housing…….But WHY is so much being Dumped in our Little Village? Well I think we all know the answer to that one don’t we?
It may not be AONB or GreenBelt (I won’t go there) but it is Countryside Beyond the Greenbelt and as the Inspector stated in Para 54.
“…. It is clearly the case that the development would lead to loss of an area of the best and most versatile agricultural land…”
In the Appeal Decision the Inspector also stated the following:
Para 56. “… Furthermore the description of development that has been agreed by the parties specifies up to 86 Houses so it would be possible within any reserved matters application to lower the number of houses in order to accommodate a LAP & LEAP together with Landscaping & drainage…”
Reserved Matter Application is filed in June 2023 and they have kept to the Full 86 and Offsetting their lack of Biodiversity net GAIN to somewhere else in the Borough..
They also removed the Green Central area that was in the Master Plan at Outline and shoved the LEAP & LAP down to the Southern Part of the Site next to car Parking and SUDS and moved the Workspace Hub to below one of the Three Storey Block of flats…….( Lucky residents!)
Following subsequent meetings with Waverley Planning officers and in response to the APC objections – they Revised the Reserved Matters Master Plan (posted 20th December 2023…convenient)
So there is now a VERY SMALL (Approx footprint of a pair of Semidetached houses & their Parking spaces) Green space with the LAP. The larger LEAP Remains by Car Park & SUDS in the Southern Corner of the site.
So now Alfold has on either side of the Petrol Station, 150 NEW HOMES being built, 86 for this Application and 64 on the Old Garden Center site including the Medland House Plot.
I think it would be most useful if you could ask your Webbers to post on this site the THREE different Master Plans so it is possible to see how this site has morphed into a High Density Housing Estate. If it helps I could email them the pictures as you know that I cannot post them up here myself.
Finally Perhaps your team can find the Revised DAS Addendum document…. With so many Documents uploaded between 15-20th December I have as yet been unable to find it and to be quite honest lost the will to live!
As ever Hugely GRUMPY
Denise Wordsworth – ALFOLD
The current Planning systems are designed to fail public interest; they only have one performance target ensuring the overloaded planning departments are forced to deliver planning decisions within inadequate timescales. This dysfunction is sustained by absurdly low planning fees, insufficient control over the quality of planning applications and too many loopholes to avoid building affordable homes. There is no antigrowth policy but hopefully an increasing concern that development should be lawful and sustainable.
There are actually TWO performance targets set by central Government
The performance of local planning authorities in determining major and non-major development will be assessed separately. The assessment for each of these two categories of development will be against two separate measures of performance:
• the speed with which applications are dealt with measured by the proportion of applications that are dealt with within the statutory time or an agreed extended period; and,
• the quality of decisions made by local planning authorities measured by the proportion of decisions on applications that are subsequently overturned at appeal.
The decisions overturned on appeal are made by the Secretary of State’s planning inspectors? They in turn have had their decisions quashed by the High Court. An independent performance target would be appeals rejected by the High Court, which has an obligation and expertise to interpret and uphold the law.