You're saying that Newbury shouldn't get any of the 10,500 new homes then? I'm asking if there are brownfield sites in and around Newbury that will provide all of the amenities of the Sandleford site and provide the family homes that Sandleford can accomodate. Not even the lib dems are promoting the Sterling, so unless they want to pack us into squats in the Kennet Center their talk of brownfield development is just so much hand-waving. When Dr. Cooper can find a brownfield site in Newbury that delivers housing like he enjoys on Garden Close Lane then fine, but there isn't one.

I'm saying that that is the only BF site I can think of of any size.

Well, WBC can say that 1500 new homes on the racecourse, in an area already afflicted by rush hour gridlock, will be fine.

Wherever they build the homes they will generate traffic - which will impact on roads aroung them. The big advantage of the Sandleford site is that there is so much local infrastructure that the residents will make shorter journeys than they would if they had to go further to shop etc.

The problem with the existing design for Sandleford is the use of Monks Lane for all traffic - a road out to the Andover Road south of Wash Common should be included.

Not strictly true.

The local plan (whatever they are calling it these days) has identified developments around West Berks that will supply most of the 10,500 homes, it also makes assumptions, based on past experience, of the number of small/individual developments they are likely to get.

This totals up to around 10,000 - but is based to some extent on guesswork - so they wanted to identify a site that could be used, if necessary, to take up any slack. This is where Sandleford came in - along with Shaw (north of Vodafone) & Thatcham (east of Floral Way).

The Sandleford developers were very quick of the mark and came up with a lovely proposal - and WBC opted for Sandleford as the contingency site. Since then the owners of the other sites have woken up and are vociferously screaming 'make me richer, make me richer instead'.

What has seemed to happen through the process is that Sandleford has gone (certainly in the public mind) from a contingency that might be approved for housing in ten years time if not enough homes are built elsewhere - to something they will start to build as soon as the local plan is approved. If they fail in their objections I wonder if the Say No To Sandleford campaign may not have made it easier for the developers to go ahead as soon as market conditions suit.

On the brownfield issue - the plan already allows for hundreds of flats in Newbury on such sites - many of which are already in the planning stage, some are already being built. The Lib Dems would like to see more industrial/office areas redesignated for residential use - eg Faraday Road, Mill Lane and town centre offices. Which is all very well but displaced businesses will want to relocate somewhere; do they want businesses to leave the area, or have they identified new greenfield industrial sites?

PS Chieveley has never been an option and why is the Thatcham site not in the poll?

Whilst it may look brown it is probably not designated as 'brownfield' - most gravel extraction schemes, when approved, come with an agreement to turn the site back into greenfield when they have finished.

It would also be difficult to get planning consent there these days when flooding has become a real issue.

The biggest brownfield development in the offing is Faraday Plaza - then there are 175 or so flats in West St (replacing Avonbank House etc). The Sterling Cables site is another that might see housing eventually. The old Travis Perkins site is designated industrial but the owners are keen to get it redesignated for residential. Of course the Parkway flats will probably also count in the 10,000. Between them these sites will probably deliver around 1000 flats.

But how many flats do we need?

The land I'm thinking of was something to do with the old Colthrop Paper mill - There are still a few old buildings on the site, a water tower & some floodlighting towers.

Flats - the UK demographic is changing and you can get a higher denisty of properties on any given footprint with flats.

60s high-rises revisited; social upheaval coming to a town near you.

I think today they are called appartments, lofts & duplexes.

as if by magic...

Little boxes made of ticky-tacky.

I'm waiting for the NoToSandleford campaign to see the Poll. Watch how the early result of 56% in favour of Sandleford changes!

If we did not have such ridiculous levels of immigration then we'd not need to build millions of new homes. Spain have 5 million homes sitting empty, more than the WHOLE of the US. Surely the Eurozone should be encouraging immigration to areas of Europe where they have millions of emtpy homes rather than foisting millions more people on an already crowded island.

People generally migrate to work - the empty housing in Spain and Ireland is a sign that there is no work there. Should employers be encouraged to move their work from Britain to Spain to discourage migration to the UK and to fill Spanish houses? With the subsequent loss to the treasury of all the taxes paid by the employers and their employees.

Those houses were built in the days when if you saw a car you tell everyone about it because they were so rare. So, by that rationale planners today had better ensure new build housing gives provision for what ever form of transort we'll be using in 2112....

Now, if there was just a central european government, those taxes wouldn't be lost.....just collected in a different region of the United States of Europe.

Personal jet packs?

It must be total chaos tonight then......

Those & teleporters requiring a roof launch pad. We'll all be sat around in 2112 wondering exactly which idiots were in charge when all these flats were built so that those on any floor but the roof were inconvenienced.

Do you think anything that was built in the last twenty years will still be standing in that sort of time?

Forget about your silly whim
It doesn't fit the Plan!