Plan for nearly 100 homes in Tadley met with backlash

PLANS for almost 100 new homes on woodland in Tadley have been met with a backlash.

Residents gathered at a Tadley Town Council planning and highways meeting on Monday to oppose the scheme, which would see up to 90 houses built on a parcel of land in the north-east corner of Bishopswood golf course.

Entrance to the site would be off Deanswood Road – currently a 12-house cul-de-sac – with the proposal for the road to be extended south and the hammerhead removed, while all the houses would be deemed ‘affordable’.

However, concerned locals lined up to criticise the scheme on the grounds that the access road was completely unsuitable for the development and that it would destroy valuable wildlife.

Matthew Young, speaking on behalf of Deanswood Road residents, accused developers Mr and Mrs Penson of paying “no respect” to current residents.

He said: “This application is for 90 houses – even a quarter of that would seem ridiculous in such a small plot of land.

“It would be a huge increase in noise and traffic along the road which is simply not designed for this kind of use.

“The proposal appears to pay little or no respect to the current residents, and I know this has caused much anxiety for myself and many others in the community.

“It’s a very badly thought out proposal and I speak for all the residents when I say we simply can’t accept it in any form.”

Martin Toovey from The Copse said: “The key point of this is the environmental cost of placing that number of properties in that area.

“I quote you that the carbon footprint of building a new two-bedroom house is 80 tonnes, and that’s the same as a single person over an entire year.

“It will be destroying valuable countryside and wildlife habitats there. This is truly the worst two-for-one presentation I’ve seen for a planning application.”

Andy Abbott added: “Rather disappointingly the planning application misleadingly described the site as an overgrown parcel of land with no discernible existing use, whereas in fact the site is predominantly oak woodland that provides an excellent and very valuable biodiverse habitat.”

The site – owned by Tadley Town Council – is outside of any settlement boundary and is located in the corner of the Tadley and Baughurst strategic gap, which helps keep the settlements apart and maintain their separate identities.

In Monday’s meeting, the council also strongly opposed the proposals.

Councillor Jo Slimin criticised the lack of detail in the plans after several statutory consultees said they were unable to provide comments as they’d been provided with insufficient detail.

She added: “I wonder how they got away with putting the application in to the point that it could possibly go forward when they haven’t supplied all the information they should be providing.

“The schools are full with waiting lists, and there are other infrastructure items that need to be addressed.

“This application has got nothing which supports it, it’s very poor.”

Councillor Warwick Lovegrove added: “Deanswood Road and Huntsmoor Road would be really overloaded – not only the residents using their cars, it would be Amazon, Tesco, Royal Mail, dustbin lorries.

“I can’t wait for this to be refused, because a lot of people’s hearts will go back to normal.”

The outline planning application will now go to Basingstoke and Deane Borough Council for consideration.

To view or comment on the plans, visit the borough council’s planning portal and enter the reference 21/01668/OUT.