Sherington Parish Council would like to respond to the Strategic Development Consultation Document.
The document outlines four options for the future development of Milton Keynes. In the opinion of Sherington Parish Council ‘ Intensification and Redevelopment of the Urban area’ and ‘Development to the South West’ are better options than ‘Development East of the M1’ and ‘Satellite Towns in the rural area’. Our favoured option would be within the present urban area, the first option mentioned. This should create a truly urban feel to Milton Keynes as opposed to a more suburban expansion over a larger area ( Development to the SouthWest).
The Parish Council is not against additional housing in the village as can be seen from the work being done with the Neighbourhood Plan but this would be in keeping with the preservation of a ‘village’ and nowhere near what is envisaged for a pleasant rural area in the options for expansion east of the M1 motorway, or of the development of ‘satellite towns’ in the rural area.
There are a number of reasons for favouring the urban area option.
- Sherington, along with many other north Buckinghamshire locations , is a rural village that people have chosen to live in because it is just that.
- The majority of the transport links are to the west and south of the urban area, not to the north and east where Sherington lies.
- There is no infrastructure in the rural area so this would have to be started from scratch and there would be considerable disruption before any housing could be contemplated. It seems pertinent to take advantage of the pre-existing infrastructure of Milton Keynes. The infrastructure cost savings could be then be deployed in a quantum leap in public transport. For example tram, light railway or other public transport could be built to link the redeveloped urban areas to the centre of the city to reduce car movements and the congestion that these journeys cause.
- All of the other options would involve discussion with neighbouring authorities with inevitable delays.
- The report highlights that around 1750 new homes need to be built each year until 2031. If Sherington took 5000 houses that would be less than three years allocation so this model would have to be repeated many times in the rural area to satisfy demand, destroying each
rural location as the plan progressed.
- Intensification is an opportunity to replace poor quality housing with state of the art urban living spaces. New developments should be environmentally efficient and carefully mixed to promote better social cohesion. Full involvement of Neighbourhood Plans should be encouraged in this.
- Urban development plays into emerging future behaviour and technology trends. The rise of Uber is reducing car ownership by the young urban dwellers in other cities such as London , Paris, New York. Why not Milton Keynes?
In conclusion ‘ Intensification and Redevelopment of the Urban area’ would allow the rural villages to remain villages while being adjacent to a modern vibrant city with all the facilities that the urban area has and would have. The North Bucks villages and their countryside should also remain an unspoilt amenity to the benefit of the city dwellers. These areas should be designated as Green Belt and the villages protected from insensitive development through use of Neighbourhood Plans which embrace the purpose of these villages as places for people to live and urban citizens to enjoy.
Looking at the even bigger picture of the country as a whole should Milton Keynes along with most of the south east of the country be considered for further large scale development causing ever more congestion and widening of the North/South divide?