BAAG Newsletter July 2011
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MoD Announcement Expected
It is rumoured that the MoD will announce the intention of the Bordon Garrison to move in 2016, but whether this is reliable or will remain so for at least the next five years is anyone’s guess. The Council will no doubt grab it as an excuse to steamroll their plan through at speed, perhaps with no further consultation. Watch out for the rigged ‘referendum that we have been predicting for some time now too.
BAAG Chairman stands down
Steve Parsons our, hard working chairman, has stood down because he and partner Liz Simes, our landscape specialist, have moved to another region. Steve led our two big public meetings at the Forest Community Centre. He was passionate and dedicated to exposing the Council’s bungling malpractices. Best known of these was Ferris Cowper’s ‘Mori Poll’ of 77 percent public approval of the eco-town when no such poll existed. Steve’s complaint for BAAG to the Advertising Standards Authority was upheld and the Council had to apologise.
Liz is a talented landscape architect whose criticism of the Council masterplan’s degradation of our local landcape value struck at the heart of their attempted cover ups through falsehoods and omissions in reporting events at the Planning Advisory Group which she regularly attended. The pair will be sorely missed. Committee member Alan Metcalf, a solicitor and long time Bordon resident will serve as interim Chairman pending a fresh intake of committee members.
Tribute to John Ilett
We were shocked and devastated to learn of our transport expert’s sudden death in May. As a director of Crest Nicholson Homes John had access to planning and transport cases from all over the country. These formed body of evidence that worried him deeply about the awful mess our politicians were planning for us. He was the principal author of BAAG’s objections to the Masterplan and Core Strategy. His immeasurable contributions towards better planning for Bordon can still be viewed on our website. The most fitting tribute to him is to keep fighting harder.
Committee seeks new members
Long time Bordon resident and Former Town Councillor Kevin Cawley has joined the Committee. His knowledge of local politics as well as the town itself will be most valuable in the coming months. All supporters are welcome to attend Committee meetings, alternate Wednesdays at 7.30 at Standford Community Hall or Standford Methodist Chapel. If you want to play a more active role in our activities please email me, Jack Warshaw at jackaro@live.co.uk
Rail study doubts viability
The Halcrow rail study forecasts a cost of at least £170 million just to build a new line linking Bordon to Bentley. Usage would need to be massively higher than Alton or Petersfield to be worthwhile. The Alton line is currently at capacity, so it looks like adding trains from Bordon could reduce the existing Alton service to 1 per hour. The study fails to address this.
Raid on Viking Park
BAAG shares concerns expressed by the Town Council over the past few years. We would have preferred Viking Park to remain natural heathland instead of being carved out of Hogmoor Inclosure. The Local Plan change to employment and leisure was reluctantly supported as a means of safeguarding land for that purpose. But a condition of the previous government’s eco-town acceptance was that EHDC deliver up to 300 “early win” houses (with no public knowledge or approval) in Bordon. With no early release of army land, the only site capable of taking most of these houses is Viking Park. The Council obviously knew at the time tey would have to contravene the Local Plan when they made the eco-town bid. They caused the masterplan to eat away at the approved use by allocating part of it for housing. They then commissioned a consultants’ “feasibility study” aimed at formally changing the use from employment to housing in advance of the Local Development Framework, thus circumventing the statutory planning process. The Council is refusing to publish the result of their ‘consultation’ about the change of use. They say it will be dismissed because, they claim, the overwhelming “no change” responses came from “a protest group!”
Do you want more of these, only bigger?
But the rumour about ASDA wanting the site threatens to kick these shady moves into touch. Just why anyone should want to welcome another supermarket, let alone ASDA to a town of near total supermarket domination must be one of the mysteries of the decade. Bordon’s Tesco was badly planned. With its huge, barren car park it has already helped to destroy the scale and potential of the High Street as a vibrant mixed use location. Another supermarket down the road would fragment the town still further, and generate infinitely more car-borne shopping trips- the opposite of an eco-town. Incredibly, the Council and even some of our own Bordon area Councillors seem to be welcoming the prospect.
ASDA represents the greatest possible threat not only to Bordon but to the whole of East Hampshire and beyond. ASDA is the UK arm of the aggressive American giant Wal Mart, the world’s largest retailer. They are known for building the largest superstores in the country. They have about 270 UK stores. Their average size, over 4.000 square meters, is much larger than their competitors. If they were to succeed in promoting one here it would suck trade from both independent traders and existing supermarkets in Bordon, Liphook, Petersfield, Alton, even Farnham and beyond. There would not only be a distortion of the Council’s plan for a new town centre, but of all regional shopping. The resulting road traffic carbon production feast would make any pretence building a green town a nightmarish joke. Strong support for employment and leisure and resistance to any change of use of Viking Park is the only way to give Bordon a fighting chance of revitalising its High Street. We need to attract the varied independent traders that make other towns in the region more delightful places to be and shop in, to dig ourselves out of this “clone town” hole.
Retrofit? No more money
While the Council publicises retrofitting existing homes as promised in their eco-town bid, that goal is unachievable because there never was sufficient funding, nor will there be. The meagre sum of £350,000 allocated to interest free loans of up to £10,000 towards energy saving measures was taken up months ago by just 35 applicants. Anyone enquiring now will be told there is no more money. If you lack loft or cavity wall insulation you can still apply for it on slightly better terms than the Government’s national subsidy scheme, worth perhaps a few hundred pounds, but beware of funds being exhausted soon for that too.
Bordon not a country town - official
That’s what Council leader Patrick Burridge said to Full Council last December. Burridge read a prepared speech, rallying fellow Tory Councillor’s in response to BAAG’s letter stating 20 reasons to reject the Masterplan. We say Bordon is a low density country town like any other, except that it’s been treated unfairly for decades by the Council. Burridge described it as “suburban in character,” meaning high density urban style development as proposed in the Masterplan is right and proper. The result? “Eco” Bordon will be an urban ghetto, separated from the existing town by the High Street.
Old fire station to remain disfigured
It seems the Council now thinks the 1960s front extension and red accordion doors built to accommodate longer fire appliances are some kind of architectural feature. Having paid half a million for it they are reneging on the promised restoration. Our BAAG website masthead has a photo of the station’s original appearance. Here’s another. . Want it properly restored? Write to your councillors
Which do you prefer? Tell your councillor
Benefit Concert funds raised
The benefit concert in May raised over £700, a small beginning to a fighting fund which will need to grow much larger in anticipation of the work ahead
If you can, send donations to:
BAAG
PO Box 180
Bordon GU35 5BP
BAAGBLOG launched – speak your mind
We now have a blog site just click or paste the link into your browser - http://baagblog.blogspot.com
Anyone can add comments on a blog of start off a new issue. Try it now!
Keep in touch with events at www.baaga.co.uk
BAAG Newsletter May 2011
Did you know ?
No more money for retrofit
Last week’s local paper featured a front page story which suggested there were special funds including interest free loans and grants of up to £10,000 available to Bordon and eco-town area homeowners to help fit energy saving measures. Indeed, the Council promised retrofitting of all existing homes in their bid for government funds nearly two years ago.
The truth is that only £330,000 out of over £10m was allocated, all of it has been spent on just 35 homes and there will be no more money coming. This was confirmed months ago when we rang the Council to enquire about it.
A government funded insulation grant scheme is available. However, this is a nation wide scheme, not unique to the Bordon eco-town experiment. In other words, there is no special funding for Bordon. We think the Council’s statements as reflected in the news items are just more misleading spin to create false hopes of special benefits which will fail to happen.
Is the army moving?
The latest information we have is that any announcement about whether the garrison will relocate is still some way off. Last December it was promised in March. In March it was put back to June. Now it is delayed until at least the autumn. Meanwhile, the Council, having spent millions on consultants and high salaried staff, does nothing to address the numerous faults, omissions, and objections to their current plans. It’s your money, watch carefully how it is being frittered away with little or nothing to show for it on the ground.
Next, it assumes that 18,000 people per day will use the train over 300 days per year. This is more than Bordon’s entire population, over 60% of the masterplan’s target population and almost 6 times the national average. Petersfied Station, on the main Portsmouth line attracts less than 7.5%. Furthermore, peak times on existing lines are already overcrowded. The study omits details of how the additional passengers would be accommodated.
No station = no more housing?
Not at all. The plan does not say that housing will be held up until a station is built. In fact it doesn’t guarantee any benefits at all. It only says that this or that so-called benefit could take place. The only certainty is that if the plan proceeds and the army goes, there will be thousands of houses- and thousands more vehicles. One councillor recently suggested we must all ride bicycles with little trailers attached. Tell that to a family with children in the dead of the British winter! Find out who here: http://www.easthants.gov.uk/ehdc/democracy.nsf/24c6ec8a79ebd3078025689a00365330/c496257e40f0a5a980256fc60034d38c?OpenDocument
See the rail study for yourself at: http://www.whitehillbordon.com/files/rail-feasibility-study-march-2011.pdf
Keep in touch with events at www.baaga.co.uk
BAAG Newsletter March 2011
Did you know ?
New facilities?
1. Eco-town project leader Daphne Gardner said in a EHDC presentation to Lindford Parish Council in January that there was "no guarantee" that facilities would come with the new development. These are the "much needed facilities" promised by EHDC to existing residents as the benefits of the eco-town. Not much of a carrot.
2. It is now increasingly clear that despite claiming to respond to local needs and demands, the principal aim of the eco-town project is to provide a large housing estate – equal to the housing demand for the whole District – thus removing development pressure from other places where housing sites have already been identified in the statutory plan.
Plan forced through
3. On December 7th , when the 'Draft Framework Masterplan " was voted through by East Hampshire District Council as a "material consideration " in future planning applications, only eleven of some forty Councillors who voted for it - had actually read the plan. Most of those who voted it through, do not live in or near Bordon and Whitehill.
4. Several public consultation events have had a negligible affect on the masterplan itself. To deflect criticism, EHDC repeatedly claim that "the plan is evolving" - yet it remains essentially the same, despite numerous adverse comments from the public.
5 Far from beginning to reach conclusions, if anything the Masterplan seems to be getting even vaguer. A recent standard letter from the Council to people who had responded to the last consultation in July 2010 explains that "it is impossible for one document to cover every issue in detail." He redefines the plan as a "direction of travel". So we have evolved from a Masterplan through a Draft Framework Masterplan, to a Direction of Travel.
No money to improve existing homes
The Council’s website and publications advertise interest free loans to existing residents to improve energy conservation. But our enquiry confirms that just £330,000 allocated for this has already been spent and there will be no more. This contrasts with millions already wasted on consultants and highly paid staff to justify and promote the Council’s plans.
EHDC Economic and Employment Strategy unsound
John Illett’s submission to the Council amply demonstrates that it has no chance of bringing the thousands of new jobs, retail shops or public transport needed to fulfil eco-town requirements. Full of ‘Vision’ statements without substance, it cannot assist investment decisions, ignores competing locations, is unsustainable and will disadvantage all surrounding communities along with Bordon itself. Go to www.baaga.co.uk to see all.
Referendum a sham?
The referendum on whether people want the Council’s expansion plan, promised over a year ago is on hold. Council leaders are secretly working out how to exclude surrounding communities and rig the question in their favour if and when they do decide to hold it
Activities
BAAG committee members continue to attend various Development Boards and Standing
Conferences to get first hand knowledge of EHDC's proposals. We continue to update you.