Woking Borough Council

Draft Site Allocations DPD - Previous Consultations

The draft Site Allocations Development Plan Document (DPD) has been subject to two rounds of public consultation. These are detailed in reverse chronological order below. Local planning authorities should also ensure that the DPD is based on adequate, up to date and relevant evidence about the economic, social and environmental characteristics and prospects of the area. The 'supporting evidence' section below explains how the Site Allocations DPD is informed by a range of evidence base studies.

Land to the East of Martyrs Lane Consultation (2017)

Following consideration of the representations received during the Regulation 18 consultation in 2015, the Council at its meeting on 20 October 2016 resolved that a further bespoke public consultation exercise be undertaken in respect of the possibility of substituting the safeguarded sites in the draft Site Allocations DPD with land to the east of Martyrs Lane to meet future development needs between 2027-2040. Members also requested that Officers revisit the suitability of Ten Acre Farm to meet the accommodation needs of Travellers.

The consultation period was from 6 January 2017 until 5pm on 27 March 2017.

For information, the Consultation document and accompanying documents included:

A total of 32,164 separate representations were received from 3,018 individuals, organisations and resident groups. The representations covered a range of broad issues as well as specific matters. The main issues were identified by Officers, who then comprehensively responded to each representation with recommendations in the following documents:

Based on the analysis of the representations and a review of the available evidence, Officers came to the view that safeguarding land east of Martyrs Lane to meet future development needs between 2027 and 2040 should not be the Coucnil's preferred approach to safeguarding of land. The LDF Working Group accepted the Officers' recommendation not to safeguard land east of Martyrs Lane; and accepted the recommendation not to allocate Ten Acre Farm as a Travellers' site. The Group also supported the Officers' revised proposals for meeting the accommodation needs of Travellers. These recommendations were subsequently supported by Council at its meeting on 18 October 2018.

Individual representations

All of the representations received during the consultation have been published and can be viewed online. Please note that representations are identifiable by surname and that there is no other search function within the software (e.g. to search by organisation). The Council has therefore prepared a list of representations submitted from organisations and statutory consultees to assist in finding these particular representations.

Paper copies of the representations are also available to view at the Civic Offices. Due to the volume of representations, the paper copies will not be kept in Reception. Therefore please contact the Planning Policy team (01483 743871) if you would like to arrange a suitable time to view the paper files.

If you are unable to find your representation then please do not hesitate to contact the Planning Policy Team on the number above or at [email protected] where we will be happy to help.

As per data protection requirements, all sensitive information including personal postal and email addresses as well as signatures have been redacted.

The Council would like to thank everyone who took the time to respond to the consultation.

If you would like to be kept informed of the Site Allocations DPD process then please email [email protected] to be added to the mailing list.

Regulation 18 Consultation (2015)

The Council carried out a public consultation (Regulation 18) on the Site Allocation Development Plan Document between June and July 2015. The Council would like to thank all those who took the time to respond.

The full representations received are available here. These are arranged in alphabetical order by the representor's surname. However, where a representor's name was not legible we have labelled the response by an assigned ID number.

The Council has summarised all the representations received and provided a response to these. The summaries and the Council's response are available here.

A number of new sites were promoted as a result of the Regulation 18 consultation. These were appraised for sustainability and, as a result, two new sites were incorporated into the next version of the Site Allocations DPD for specific uses: land at Brookwood Cemetary and land at Woking Football Club.

For reference purposes, you can still view all of the Draft Site Allocations DPD consultation documents (June - July 2015) below. There were three consultation documents:

Supporting Evidence

The identification of sites for future development is based on clear, up to date evidence about potential development land in the Borough. As part of the Site Allocations DPD the Council has considered provision of sites for various types of uses including land for general housing and to meet the need for Gypsy and Traveller and Travelling Showpeople accommodation, employment, new open spaces and new infrastructure.

The evidence base (research reports and other information) supporting preparation of the Site Allocations is available here. Examples of the evidence base are the Green Belt boundary review, Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment (SHLAA) and the Employment Land Review. Since the publication of the draft DPD, the Council has carried out further studies to address a number of concerns raised by representations, including the A320 Corridor Study; A245 Corridor Mitigation Measures Study; Woking Town Centre Modelling Assessment, review of the Infrastructure Delivery Plan, a review of the SHLAA, and a review of the Employment Topic Paper.

The identification of potential development land is informed by an annual Call for Sites. In 2015, the Draft Site Allocations DPD consultation provided the opportunity to propose new potential development sites to the Council. Again in 2017, the revision of the Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment (SHLAA) provided another opportunity to propose sites.

New sites suggested that have an anticipated capacity of 10 net additional dwellings or 500 sq. m or more commercial or other non-residential floorspace have been assessed for their suitability for allocation in the publication stage of the Site Allocations DPD. Any suggested new sites falling beneath this site capacity threshold have been used instead to inform the revised Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment (SHLAA), the Housing Land Supply Position Statement and the Employment Land Review as appropriate.

The Sustainability Appraisal Report explains how sites were appraised to inform the Draft Site Allocations DPD. A Site Assessment methodology is also available.

For more information

If you have any questions on the Site Allocations DPD or would like to subscribe to the Planning Policy mailing list, please contact the Planning Policy team at [email protected] or on 01483 743871.