23 January 2017
Dear Editor,
If this were literally a 'Bailrigg' garden village, and with the government's £200k payment to the city council to fund master-planning, this would be an idea replete with possibility to do house-building and community creation, clustered around the university, a whole lot better. We don't need to go very far for an
exemplar – Halton Mills is it in terms of low-energy, well-thought-through homes and community.
But when the 'village' stretches way beyond anything that can reasonably be identified as Bailrigg - now east of the M6 and west to Lancaster canal – it's scarcely different from what until very recently was known as Urban Extension One. It's been re-branded as a 'garden village' because the government doesn't like the term 'urban extension' - implying, as it does, anonymous, sprawling suburbanisation.
Master-planning is essential if the scheme is to achieve anything resembling 'sustainable development'. But how is the integrity of that masterplan to be maintained? The residents of the Moor Hospital housing sites, north and south of Quernmore Rd., are all too aware of the differences between plan and execution. The master-planning there laid down the need for a primary school, protection of the 'urban green space' including the bowling green, and sustainable transport measures. All have either not been delivered or, in the case of a better bus service and enhanced walking and cycling opportunities, very late and partially.
Designation as a garden village comes with what government calls 'planning freedoms'. The Financial Times amplifies the meaning: 'The settlements will also enjoy special planning freedoms in a bid to encourage developers.' So there looks likely to be continual tension between the masterplan's ideals and the way the volume house-builders actually operate.
There is a good idea in the garden village but its geographical spread is the critical point of contention. No good idea ends up surburbanising the beautiful, tranquil landscape west of Burrow Heights to Lancaster canal.Yours sincerely,
Cllr Tim Hamilton-Cox,
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