Object

Schedule of Main Modifications and changes to Policies Maps

Representation ID: 24628

Received: 09/09/2019

Respondent: Welbeck Land LLP

Agent: Strutt & Parker LLP

Legally compliant? Not specified

Sound? No

Duty to co-operate? Not specified

Representation Summary:

The amendment being proposed would provide sufficient flexibility should a doctor's surgery be incapable of being delivered, and is therefore supported in principle.

However, it remains an onerous requirement in addition to the requirement for 40% affordable housing and 50% age-restricted units. The policy remains undeliverable as a result of it being unviable and the council has not provided any evidence to justify all of these requirements. The viability of the policy as a whole was not tested in the Three Dragons Viability Assessment (October 2018) and no further evidence was presented at the hearing sessions or indeed as part of the Main Modifications. If all three requirements continue to be Rother's aspirations for the site, either this needs to be justified through additional viability evidence, or the policy should provide sufficient flexibility to enable this matter to be explored further during the course of a planning application.

Site FAC2 remains undeliverable as a result of the onerous policy requirements making it unviable, and this is of significant concern to Welbeck as it progresses its pre-application discussions with Rother for a policy-compliant scheme.

Full text:

The amendment being proposed would provide sufficient flexibility should a doctor's surgery be incapable of being delivered, and is therefore supported in principle.

However, it remains an onerous requirement in addition to the requirement for 40% affordable housing and 50% age-restricted units. The policy remains undeliverable as a result of it being unviable and the council has not provided any evidence to justify all of these requirements. The viability of the policy as a whole was not tested in the Three Dragons Viability Assessment (October 2018) and no further evidence was presented at the hearing sessions or indeed as part of the Main Modifications. If all three requirements continue to be Rother's aspirations for the site, either this needs to be justified through additional viability evidence, or the policy should provide sufficient flexibility to enable this matter to be explored further during the course of a planning application.

Site FAC2 remains undeliverable as a result of the onerous policy requirements making it unviable, and this is of significant concern to Welbeck as it progresses its pre-application discussions with Rother for a policy-compliant scheme.

We request that a further amendment is made to either the policy wording or pre-text to provide flexibility should a viability appraisal submitted with a planning application demonstrate that all three policy requirements cannot be met.