Agenda item

To receive any questions relating to items on the Agenda from members of the public and replies thereto.

Note:   A maximum of 30 minutes is allowed for this item.

Councillor Gordon Guest speaking on behalf of Cullompton Town Council and referring to item 10 on the agenda stated that Cullompton Town Council have on 3 occasions voted to oppose that application based on the fact of access. DCC required access to go through the existing Siskin Chase and Cullompton Town Council do not consider that is adequate for a development of this size and have argued that there should be additional access coming off Colebrooke Lane. The other aspect that Cullompton Town Council are aware of but is not part of this planning application is that there will in the future be houses on the rugby club site when that relocates and therefore DCC have insisted that with Siskin Chase site there is an area of land set aside for a road link between Siskin Chase and the rugby club and so in the future the Town Council feel that there will be additional traffic coming down from the rugby club site through the Siskin Chase development and therefore a proper road link out through Colebrooke Lane would be much more appropriate than what is in the plans.

He added that he would not go through all the Cullompton Town Council objections to plan, just to say that basically the Town Council have rejected the application on each occasion based on that access coming through the existing road and there not being another access from Colebrooke Lane. That’s the basis of the Town Councils rejection of the Siskin Chase application.

The second point that I wish to raise with the planning committee is that Colebrooke Lane and the Colebrooke stream which is in two parts and has a culvert which goes underneath Colebrooke Lane floods regularly and the flooding is increasing in regularity and severity and on 19^th December 2019 Colebrooke Lane was completely flooded and the depth of water was such that it was impassable to vehicles except very large tractors. The flooding actually went uphill and flowed into Swallow Way which as you know is a major road, then down Swallow Way to the roundabout on Exeter Road. Some three years ago I walked with residents and a lady called Jessica Bishop from the Environment Agency along the stream and at that point she identified a number of obstructions and things that were overgrown to the south of the Colebrook culvert and to the north of the Colebrook culvert but in the time since then nothing further has been done to either of those areas, the south side of the culvert has not been cleaned out and the north side has not been cleaned out and widened. There are questions which would need further investigations as to whether the culvert itself is damaged by tree roots and so on. Years ago DCC cleaned out further down the culvert under the roundabout at Exeter Road and they widened the stream and raised the banks and did a lot of works there to prevent further flooding but they did nothing up at Colebrooke Lane. So the concern at Colebrooke Lane if you are going to put in 105 houses, all the construction traffic is going to disrupt the field and an existing flooding problem is going to be made worse and there aren’t any plans to put that in place.

Within the plans for Siskin Chase there are attenuation ponds for the current development but there is nothing in the plan by the developer to sort out the existing problem. In discussion with the developers who said ‘if it’s a problem that’s already there it’s not for us to sort it out’. So that’s an argument that MDDC can have with various agencies. We are very concerned that the flooding at Colebrooke Lane continues, the frequency continues, it threatens properties in the area and we feel that planning permission shouldn’t be granted for the time being to the Siskin Chase development until such plans are in place to sort out the Colebrooke stream either side of that culvert and potentially even the need for an extra attenuation pond in the field to the north, close to the culvert to take excess storm water when that happens. So that’s the basis of the rejection for development of Siskin Chase for 105 houses. The road access should be off Colebrooke Lane and the flooding in Colebrooke Lane and the culvert should all be sorted prior to any development taking place on that site.

Mr Norman Harper speaking as a resident of the Padbrook Estate in Cullompton and referring to item 10 on the agenda stated that many of his words had been echoed by Cllr Gordon Guest and that he had witnessed many times now the flooding of Colebrook Lane. This renders the lane unusable by the emergency services. So desperate work, should the development go ahead, will be required to reduce this flooding risk. The flooding itself flows from Colebrooke Lane out onto Swallow Way, continues down Swallow Way to the Exeter Road roundabout then crosses the road affecting properties in Exeter Road, flows past them and into the Knightswood Estate. Knightswood Estate has had some alleviation of flooding hence the previous work on the B3181 at the Toad Hall Knightswood junction where larger culverts were put in place to stop the stream over topping and that seems to be successful to this day.

Roger Harris,a resident at Siskin referring to item10 on the agenda stated that at the planning meeting held on Wednesday 5^th June 2019 regarding this application I asked two questions:

1.    How Siskin Chase could be used as a through road when at one point it is only 3.55 metres wide and not wide enough for two vehicles to pass

2.    I pointed out the restricted visibility at the junction of Siskin Chase and Swallow Way due to the houses at the end of Siskin Chase

Neither of these questions were answered. In her presentation Mrs Fish never mentioned the 3.55 metre stretch of road nor did she produce any photographs of it. Neither did she produce photographs of the junction at Siskin Chase and Swallow Way. Mr Sorenson made remarks that the road has to be 5.55 metres wide but again made no reference to the fact that at one point it is 3.55 metres wide. Why did Mrs Fish fail to make any reference to these facts in her presentation to yourselves? Surely it is within her remit to present all the facts to this planning committee, in fairness to all interested parties and not just those supporting her own recommendations. Madam Chairman stated that at the time all our questions would be answered, it is now some eight months since that last meeting and those two questions have never been answered and never been replied to. So I ask the same two questions again. As a former Police Road Safety Officer I would like to know how it is intended to make this stretch of road that is 3.55 metres wide safe for the residents who already live there. Speed humps would lead to a high increase in air pollution, you cannot use priority signs or even traffic lights because of the road junctions immediately at both ends of this piece of road with traffic emerging from the side junctions could not comply with any signs. All the houses in Siskin, Linnet Dean and Starlings Roost are open plan frontage with nothing to stop children or animals running out into the road. The two hundred extra vehicles if Siskin is opened up will be through this road and will add serious problems with road safety. As this has never been mentioned by the Planners can somebody from the Planning Department please explain how such a serious problem will be efficiently, effectively and safely dealt with so that we are protected and our children and our grandchildren are protected. My third question has been mainly covered by the previous speaker again with regard to the flooding. But I would simply say this, we all know that the land adjoining the proposed development which at the moment is owned by the rugby club is going to be sold for development. Now this is an opportunity to build or plan for a through road from Colebrooke Lane to Knowle Lane. The junction for Colebrooke Lane and Swallow Way is clear and unobstructed and could be widened without affecting other properties, there would be no road safety issues and air pollution would be reduced instead of going through Siskin. Is it not time that DCC stopped using Cullompton as a dumping ground for housing without putting something back into the actual community directly affected and build a new road and flood prevention scheme for the benefit of local people. Putting the road through Siskin will save money but it will put lives in danger. What is more important money or people’s lives? Money can be replaced lives cannot. Perhaps somebody can explain why money is more important than people’s lives. My last question relates to the Local Plan Review 2013 – 2033 where under policy of CU21 ‘Land at Colebrooke’ item C provision of two points of access from Siskin Chase which gives you the impression that’s its already been agreed that Siskin Chase will be opened up and that the traffic from both of these proposed developments will come through Siskin Chase. This means that we will have not only the two hundred vehicles but probably another three hundred vehicles coming through Siskin Chase. Once again putting the lives of our children and grandchildren at risk. It does seem strange that this is already printed and is on policy and yet here we are discussing it at a planning committee meeting.

Mr Jones again referring to item 10 on the agenda stated that he would like to take a rewind and a step back to the last notice of this development to local residents. It didn’t describe this last application but a new application by the developer. Subsequently any residents that wished to submit any observations would have to resubmit new observations. This is an anomaly that should have been addressed and I’m not apportioning any blame to the staff of the planning department who have probably got too much work. This anomaly still exists so subsequently a lot of residents were unaware that they had to resubmit their observations and subsequently this gives an unfair advantage to the developer because it can be seen that not so many people have not submitted new observations. Indeed it took a neighbour of mine printing off a slip of paper and dropping it through local peoples letterboxes to notify them of it. I think that councillors need to be aware of this and it is quite undemocratic and unfair.