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The Chilterns Conservation Board would like to highlight our previous submissions on the Central Beds Local Plan. We understand that these will continue to be taken into account by the Council and the Inspectors in the consideration of the soundness of the local plan.
Our opposition to the North of Luton development area (policy SA1 etc) and the associated M1-A6 link road is maintained in the context of the additional evidence.
Fundamentally, the Board’s opposition to these proposals arises from the failure of the council to properly apply the major development test enshrined in para 172 of the NPPF (and its predecessors) in selecting both the development site and the route of the link road, in particular a failure to properly consider alternatives. The additional evidence, for example in documents Exam 110, 112, 113, 114 and 115, provides some retrospective support for decisions already taken by the Council, but this does not address the main point that sustainable alternatives that avoid harm to the Chilterns AONB in the first place have not been considered when drawing up the plan’s spatial strategy.
On this point, the Board draws the Inspector’s attention to the first (unnumbered) paragraph on p.10 of the non-technical summary of the SA Supplementary Report (document Exam 115a), which states: “Looking across the 19 residential site options as a whole, the likely sustainability effects are not particularly varied in terms of the number of likely significant positive and negative effects identified.” This demonstrates that the choices assessed by the Council (which, arguably, were far from exhaustive) are, in most respects, equivalent in terms of pros and cons.
The following paragraph goes on to state that “Luton North Option 1 also has three significant negative effects but these are counterbalanced by four significant positive effects. The other two Luton North options have two significant negative and three significant positive effects each.” This demonstrates that the Council appear to have taken a fairly superficial, arithmetic approach to their consideration of the SA, which bears closer scrutiny, and is unfortunate given that, in the case of policy SA1, the identified negative impacts relate to harm to the nationally designated AONB, highlighted in the NPPF (para 172) as deserving “the highest status of protection”, where “great weight” should be given to their conservation and enhancement and where “the scale and extent of development … should be limited.” The harm that will be caused to the AONB and its setting (and the other harms identified in the SA, e.g. to settlement identity and heritage) by the policy SA1 proposal and its associated link road are givens – they will definitely happen – whereas the benefits identified in the SA, from community facilities and sustainable transport to climate change) will depend very much on how well the development is implemented. In the context of the deregulation of planning under the current reforms, plus the inevitable changes in viability that will be argued if the forecast recession lasts, the benefits of the current proposals are very much in question.
The selection of sites from those assessed in the SA must be made on a more sophisticated basis than simply balancing positives and negatives: if there is any alternative that has similar positives without causing harm to an area that the NPPF requires to be given “the highest status of protection”, then the alternative must be selected.
Furthermore, the SA currently scores the Landscape impacts of the North of Luton options 2 and 3 as “minor negative” with a question mark. The Board considers that both these options will have a significant or major impact on the landscape in this location, especially given that all three options are contained within the same site boundary and are associated with the M1-A6 link road. While the Board would acknowledge that a smaller development would, potentially, have a lower impact, this does not mean that the impact would be “minor”.
In view of the above, it remains difficult to see how the Council has applied its duty under section 85 of the Countryside and Rights of Way Act 2000 to have regard to the purpose of conserving and enhancing the natural beauty of the area. By creating a form of development built out to a bypass both of which cause direct harm to the AONB as well as its setting (and with no thought of enhancement of the natural beauty of the area), without full consideration of alternatives that would not cause such harm, and without a clear public interest justification (which cannot be made without considering those alternatives), these proposals render the Plan unsound, both from a legal compliance point of view and from the perspective of the achievement of sustainable development.
While the reduction of the scale of the SA1 development from 4,000 to 3,100 homes potentially reduces its impact (but not, as noted above, from “major?” to “minor?”), there is no concomitant amendment to the route or impact of the link road. Furthermore, the proposed main modifications to policy SA1 in document Exam 117 are not compliant with national policy on AONBs. (Note that (a) the user accessibility of the Modifications document is hampered by the failure to number each modification, and (b) the Council has chosen not to show on the maps accompanying these modifications either the AONB boundary or the route of the proposed M1-A6 link road, which is “essential” for the SA1 proposal.)
It remains the Board’s view that the SA1 proposal and the M1-A6 link road should be reduced further in scale and impact to avoid direct harm to the AONB and reduce harm arising from development in its setting, but if the Inspector is minded to support the current unsustainable scale of development, then we would like to make the following comments:
1. The modifications include inconsistencies in how the volume of new homes is described (e.g. “approximately” or “at least” 3,100 dwellings); if the outcome of the SA has been to reject options for 3,600 and 4,000 homes on this site as being unsustainable, then there is good reason to clearly cap the proposal at 3,100 homes.
2. The wording of the “Eastern Bowl” modification is unclear. What does “beyond” the Eastern Bowl mean? This may be clear to the author, but it may be re-interpreted by a clever planning barrister. Similarly, to which part of the site does “on this part of the site” refer – the Eastern Bowl, or the bit “beyond” it? A labelled site diagram might help.
3. In the same modification the part referring to development within the Eastern Bowl is not compliant either with the NPPF or with section 85 of the CROW Act, and is a critical and fatal flaw in the modifications. Critically, these throwaway words entirely negate the reduction of the scale of development in policy SA1 from 4,000 to 3,100, by allowing for additional development on this part of the site, without the opportunity to seek alternatives that will not cause harm to the AONB. In effect, the proposal as currently worded is no different from the original 4,000 home proposal, and should therefore be rejected for the same reason. This section also implies that development on the rest of the SA1 site (including those parts that fall within the AONB) will not be subject to rigorous assessment in terms of its impacts on the AONB and its setting, with a requirement not only for mitigation, but enhancement, as required by the CROW Act.
4. The modifications confirm that, even for the reduced 3,100 home development to go ahead, it is “essential that the development is served by the M1-A6 link road”. Since this road will have a significant harmful impact on the AONB, and development that is dependent upon the link road must, by definition, also have a significant harmful impact – this confirms the issue identified above regarding the assessment of the landscape impact in the SA Supplementary Document.
With regard to the M1-A6 link road, the Board recognises (but does not agree with) the planning permission for the road’s construction, and notes the outcome of recent legal action on that matter. In our view, the need for such a road as part of a strategic East-West route is constantly being reduced as a result of (a) increasing likelihood of improved strategic East-West transport options as part of the Oxford-Cambridge Arc proposals, and (b) changing work and travel patterns arising from the post-Covid “new normal” (in addition of course to the need to reduce carbon emissions and address air quality issues). If there is a still a need for some improved connectivity here, including as part of a reduced development proposal consistent with the area’s location within and in the setting of the Chilterns AONB, then a smaller scale local distributor road within the development would be sufficient. For this reason, we consider it proper and appropriate that the link road be removed from the Plan, allowing for the current planning permission not to be implemented.
