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A NEWLY formed alliance group in West Devon is urging residents to lobby their borough councillors to vote against a blueprint plan for the next 15 to 20 years, which they fear would result in the ‘overdevelopment of Tavistock and Okehampton’.
The borough’s controversial core strategy was the subject of a parish poll in Tavistock earlier this year — 90% of people who voted said the proposals for the town were unacceptable.
The elements of the local development framework which have been strongly opposed are the building of 750 houses and a link road through the Tavy Valley, but there are also plans for a new hospital, new school and the re-instatement of the rail link to Bere Alston.
Last Saturday members of the new Rural Communities Alliance, including prospective parliamentary Liberal Democrat candidate for West Devon and Torridge Adam Symons, were out in force at Tavistock Pannier Market encouraging electors to join in the campaign.
A specially sculpted giant hand was on show symbolising the ‘helping hand’ the RCA is giving to try and halt the adoption of the core strategy.
The RCA is encouraging electors of the borough to write to their councillors urging them to vote against the blueprint as it stands.
The group wants a development plan that it feels will more accurately reflect the wishes of the electorate. Many letters have already been sent to the leader of the council, Cllr James McInnes, asking that he intervene.
The borough council recently agreed that work on the core strategy was required following the consultation responses, but the view of officers is that the plan is still sound.
Jeremy Davies, who is chair of the RCA, said despite adjustments being made in response to the criticisms, there was no indication that the council’s ‘urban sprawl policy’ would be abandoned.
The RCA is calling for more housing to be dispersed throughout the district.
He said there were also many residents in Okehampton against the core strategy, which focussed on building all the new houses on the east side of the town.
‘Until there is a firm indication from West Devon Borough Council that their revision of the strategy will entail a fundamental change, it can reasonably be assumed that it intends to keep its discredited urban extension plan, at the same time giving inadequate consideration to the well-documented decline of the borough’s rural communities,’ he said.
‘The consultation period is over so there will be no other opportunity for the public to influence this plan, but we can try to influence the councillors, because it will be up to them.’
Mr Symons said: ‘Public feeling is running very high on this issue. Our residents’ surveys show that most people just don’t want this scale of development.
‘West Devon Borough Council obviously has not demonstrated to the public the evidence to support this housing allocation. They need to go back and think again.
‘Many of the rural areas are crying out for more housing, yet the council seems oblivious to this. Building on the proposed green fields will impinge on a World Heritage Site and seriously degrade the adjacent Area of Outstanding Natural Beauty, quite apart from causing severe congestion problems in Tavistock.’
The final core strategy will go before the planning inspector next summer.
Leader of the council James McInnes said there had been five consultations where local people had been able to put forward their views and these views had been taken on board, including the parish poll, in which only 12.8% of the population of Tavistock took part.
He said the council had to take into account the overwhelming evidence of housing need and provide a strategy to deal with everything that was needed to live a modern life in West Devon.
‘I understand the concerns about the increase in housing and I share them, but we have to address the needs up to 2026 and provide the best solution.’
He said building housing developments in several different areas of Tavistock would be more likely to change the character of the town than concentrating it in one place.
‘People need to be aware that 36% of the housing is going into the villages, it’s not all going into Tavistock and Okehampton. We have looked at many options but I believe the current option is the best one for the whole of West Devon.’
A final decision on the core strategy is not expected until next March at the earliest.

http://www.okehampton-today.co.uk/tn/news.cfm?id=47133