Comment

Sir.-Councillor Harvey makes an impassioned plea for a deep-rooted debate about the balance of control in planning and developing the borough (Gazette, July 10).

He is right to suggest that a balance needs to be achieved. However, he is wrong to suggest that local officers and politicians are at the heart of the problem.

Since becoming a councillor, I have been amazed at just how little influence communities and their elected representatives have in the planning and development process - even gobsmacked to witness how a strong local voice, supported by public enquiry, can be overridden at the whim of the Secretary of State - as we saw in Oakley all too recently.

Residents in my own ward of Rooksdown have been waiting more than a decade for the provision of basic facilities such as shops, a surgery, school and community centre.

In my opinion, the root cause has been the continued prevarication of the then Office of the Deputy Prime Minister in releasing for development the land on the former Park Prewett site.

Decisions on parcels of land were made and then unmade until the industry almost lost interest in the scheme - which would have been a disaster for the houses already built and occupied.

As a consequence of these delays, instead of the new village and community we were promised, we have endured a patchwork approach of delay, disruption and disappointment. Rooksdown has worked hard to become a community with heart and spirit, but we still have no community centre.

We have also suffered the centralised imposition of parking standards which turned a woeful blind eye to the reality of modern-day living.

As a result, we have poor parking provision, which may meet the then centralised standards, but places a modern community in no better position than those built before motor cars became essential, not luxury, items.

There are things being done locally to redress the balance - consultation and adoption of new parking standards, officer action and council funding to support the organisation of community events in lieu of a community centre (and we can now see light at the end of the tunnel on a community building too).

However, in having a debate about the future development of Basingstoke and Deane, can we also at least acknowledge the framework of centralised imposition that binds the hands of local officers and politicians while washing its own hands of the consequences for our communities.

-Councillor Karen Cherrett, (Conservative), Rooksdown Ward, Basingstoke.

Sir.-I have many concerns about the recent planning applications that affect the communities I represent.

Did you know that more than 1,200 flats have been proposed in just three recent planning applications and still no one is addressing the problems of traffic movement, parking and the lack of sales in the present properties?

On the old Beechwood Lodge Site, the private block has only had two people move in during the last few months. The planners who said that there are good transport links so you don't need so many parking spaces must live somewhere in cloud cuckoo land. And now we see proposals for the 313 flats on the land opposite.

It seems madness yet again - it's all flats! That plot of land could be used to benefit the community. Nursing homes and single-storey homes for the elderly are desperately needed in the borough, as well as homes with gardens for families.

I'm also dismayed at the news that BCOT is restricting parking for its students. Is this so they can defend the reduction of 150 parking spaces if they get the new college on Kingsclere Road, and that's even before the target of a 25 per cent increase in students and the extra staff who would also need to find parking?

Isn't it time there was a proper assessment of infrastructure needs? Shouldn't the council start looking at planning applications as a whole, not one by one with no, or little, thought or feedback from residents?

We need to learn the lessons of where development has worked.

-Councillor Jane Frankum, (Labour), Popley West Ward, Basingstoke.

12:19pm Monday 21st July 2008

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