OPINION: Letters to the editor of the Newbury Weekly News
Hopefully the Eagle Quarter plan is dead
Three cheers to our councillors, who have, hopefully once and for all, rejected this absurdly named Eagle Quarter development (I have lived in Newbury since 1968, but have yet to see any eagles swooping over this part of the town!).
This monstrosity would be totally out of character for the town, apart from the three years or so that Newbury would be a horrendous building site.
I also hope that people will now be more positive about the Kennet Centre.
There’s no reason why it shouldn’t be reasonably successful, but people, including some councillors, continually talk it down, saying things like: “It’s a shopping centre in the wrong part of the town.” ( I’d like someone to explain that one to me.)
It’s no wonder we can’t attract more businesses there, because of such negative talk.
I have yet to meet one person who was in favour of this development and hopefully, Mr Haig and Lochailort will now disappear quietly into the sunset never to return!
Let them wreck some other town if they want to. Newbury does not want you.
Dave Shields
Kennedy Close, Newbury
So glad Eagle Quarter has been turned down
I am glad the council turned down the Eagle Quarter application.
It’s a ridiculous name and an oversized building for Newbury.
Eight-storeys high is way too high for a market town like Newbury.
If it went ahead, all those residents going to and coming from work would cause even more traffic chaos, and nowhere for shoppers to park at weekends.
There are not enough job vacancies in Newbury for these proposed residents to find work locally – so there would be more traffic problems – and extra load on local doctors and other social and health services.
I think the current Kennet Centre should remain but have a full facelift and refurbishment – and encourage smaller retail outlets to occupy the premises.
The developers are wrong in their assumptions that Newbury and surrounding residents want this development.
It is so out of keeping with the rest of Newbury’s buildings.
I hope their appeal fails as well.
Mike Anthony
Newbury
Eagle Quarter plan is not in line with policies
The Kennet Centre appeared in the early documents for our Local Plan Review (LPR) as Site NEW3.
It was included within several evidence base documents including the HELAA where it stated that redevelopment could possibly consist of a mixed site allocation, including some housing, retail, office and possibly a medical centre.
However, this important site, the Kennet Centre, somehow dropped away as we moved towards the ill-timed submission of the LPR 2021-2037 in March 2023, and into Examination by a Planning Inspector that started in May 2024 and is still under way.
The site removal may have been down to a decision by the WBC local planning authority (LPA) to exclude previously developed lands (PDL)/brownfields from the Local Plan Review (LPR) 2021-2037 if they were within settlement boundaries.
We can find no evidence that this is a commonly adopted approach by other LPAs, and indeed the National Planning Policy Framework encourages a PDL/brownfield first approach especially in Key Sites in town centres where the strategic intent is to revamp and increase density.
In the hierarchy of the LPR 2023-2041 Newbury is identified as no.1 – major town centre.
However, now we have a situation where, rather than being part of a holistic Newbury Expansion and Redevelopment Plan, the Eagle Quarter proposal has come forward as a speculative windfall site without an appropriate Site Allocation Policy, outside new Strategic Policy 13 (unlucky for some), without any Supplementary Planning Document (SPD), local development orders.
Outside Residential Design Codes covering form (siting, orientation, scale, tall buildings, massing, materials and details which make it fit into the Conservation Area and listed buildings around it).
The Newbury Town Masterplan has little mention of quality design for this key site. That masterplan, as a document, has no weight in planning as it is not an SPD.
NB, we have other quite visual sites nearby that have been treated in the same way by exclusion from the proper 15-year Local Development Plan.
Had the site been in the current LPR 2023-2041 it would have forced the production of appropriate policies and design codes to guide any developer wishing to come forward with a planning application.
Also, it would have been halfway through examination by a qualified and experienced planning inspector who should be looking at a holistic plan for the most important town within West Berks Council’s remit.
Instead, councillors were faced with a dilemma of deciding whether to accept a speculative windfall planning application in which the officers’ recommendation was based on working in private with the developer and outside the Local Development Plan in which public consultations are an integral part.
Officers and the developer were coming up with proposals and personal opinions outside appropriate planning policy.
Now we face the possibility of further costs for another inspector coming along and dealing with an appeal by the developer whose windfall and out-of-context planning application was rejected by hard-pressed councillors who know how this site should really have been dealt with.
Paula Saunderson
River Walk, Newbury
Town must evolve or it will lose its vitality
It’s really disappointing to see the plans to redevelop the Kennet Centre turned down yet again.
As someone relatively young who moved to Newbury in the last year, I can say this is a great place.
It has so much going for it – from retail and small businesses to genuine civic energy through its culture and social enterprise.
Just look at the owners of Brew Blood coffee shop, who loved it so much after visiting that they moved their whole world to stay here.
But here’s the thing – a town stays alive through its ability to reinvent and inject new life.
A modern development would have let the town look ahead to the future while keeping the best of its past.
Part of that bigger picture means having different kinds of people living close to the town centre to keep its spirit alive.
That includes people like me, who don’t qualify for affordable housing but aren’t in a position to buy their own home yet.
Build-to-rent schemes, like what was proposed for the Eagle Quarter, would help people who are at that stage of their lives.
I live in the Weavers Yard development that seems to cop a lot of criticism.
People say no one lives here – but has anyone actually bothered to come and ask whether we exist and what we think? It’s hard to escape the feeling that we’re not welcome and are somehow disturbing a town of retirees.
And we’re not just passing through – quite the opposite. Like many newer residents, I’m actively putting down roots here.
I’ve recently become co-chair of governors at a local school because I care about this town’s future.
That’s exactly why the resistance to change worries me. I’ve seen what happens in towns that don’t evolve – I’ve watched countless northern communities I once called home slowly lose their vitality.
Without working together to thoughtfully renew Newbury, the very things people are trying to protect will gradually fade away.
I urge the planning committee and the Newbury Society to reconsider their opposition to the Kennet Centre development.
Let’s create a Newbury that works for everyone – and where new generations can help keep our town centre thriving.
Thom Byrne
Newbury
Hospital is not a safe place for the unwell
I have had the misfortune today of needing a GP appointment.
I have an asthma-like condition as well as cancer.
I have been sent to Reading Hospital instead of doing a local GP. It has cost me £60 in a taxi to get here and will cost the same in my return.
The hospital is bursting with people coughing and spluttering.
I am immunocompromised!
The chances of leaving with an infection are almost 100 per cent. It’s total madness.
I don’t even need a hospital visit. Just an inhaler, in all likelihood.
Anyone that is seriously unwell is in serious trouble.
We don’t have a healthcare system anymore. It’s no longer fit for purpose.
Daniel Lindenbaum
Newbury
Too much violence on the television soaps
No wonder the TV shows are losing viewers as they are showing too much violence.
It’s no longer entertaining.
Why do they keep taking on new people if they can’t afford them?
The first person to get rid of is Ken Barlow as he gets a big payment for doing nothing. He just sits on a chair at home or in the pub.
Just because he has been there a long time doesn’t mean he has to stay.
All the old ones get their pension so they should find out how we live.
Goodbye to both Coronation Street and Emmerdale.
As for losing advertising, most things are over-advertised as they don’t do as they say they will.
Keith Haines
Poplar Place, Newbury
Here’s a health update after my last letter
I wish to thank the Newbury Weekly News for printing my letter asking for help after having my vocal chords removed.
This nice lady took time and replied to my letter asking for help because I can’t talk.
So I’d like to update and tell her what’s happened over the last six months.
Each day I tried and tried to say a word, month after month, then I was over the moon.
I used all my energy to get a word out.
At last now I can say my grandchildren’s names.
The younger ones think I’m playing a game by talking strangely.
Sadly, there is a downside. I must not keep on using all my energy for talk because more phlegm comes up and blocks my breathing tube.
Now the other good news.
In November the cancer doctor said the scan and blood test are really encouraging and the immunotherapy treatment is fighting off the cancer.
Little Pete
Laburnum Grove, Newbury
Can anyone identify this wedding photo?
This lovely mounted photograph of a wedding party has languished in a loft for many years.
Unfortunately no-one knows who the couple or family are – the back does not have anything written on it.
It is believed it is in the Newbury area, and the groom is wearing a Silver War Badge (first issued in 1916 to service personnel who had been honourably discharged due to wound, illness or old age between 1914 and 1919), this would date the photo as sometime during the 1920s.
If anyone has any ideas please email newsdesk@newburynews.co.uk
Gareth Martin
Treasurer and membership secretary, Kingsclere Local History Association
