Curborough ECO Town Consortiums admit defeat

by Copied from FACT press release - Richard Holloway - 14:46 on 08 July 2008

Referring to the plan to build an ECO town of between 5,000-20,000 on greenfield land just north of Lichfield in Staffordshire :-

The Curborough Consortium, a group of private companies seeking to cash in on the Government eco-town agenda, has today finally admitted defeat in trying to get their proposed development of a 5000-home town near Lichfield past the Government’s eco-town scrutiny panel. 

The Consortium has withdrawn its eco-town proposal following a scathing report by the Government’s scrutiny panel, which labelled the proposal as “not yet an eco-town” and went on to reveal a series of structural flaws in the plan, concluding that “the eco-element feels like an ‘add-on’ to an existing application rather than embedded in the concept.” 

Representatives of FACT, the Fradley based Community Group, challenged the Housing Minister at a private meeting on the report findings and sought her assurance that the Curborough proposal would be axed as a result. 

FACT Chairman Richard Holloway welcomed the news, saying: 

“Naturally we are pleased that this flawed and opportunistic development proposal will now not go ahead, and I would like to thank FACT volunteers for their tireless efforts in ensuring that the communities of Lichfield and surrounding villages were properly represented in this process and their voices were heard. 

“We are, however, slightly puzzled that the Consortium statement states that the Government had recognised the merits of the location of the scheme, as the Government’s panel of experts said no such thing. 

“Whilst this signals the death of the eco-town proposal, the Consortium still has a planning application underway for a standard development of exactly the same size and impact, and which would create the same blight on the area without offering any pretence that it had eco-benefits.

 “FACT will therefore continue to ensure that local people have their say concerning this application.”

 ENDS

 ********************************************

Whilst this is good news we still have a lot of work to do.

 1. We need confirmation from the Government that "Curborough" site is no longer being considered for an ECO TOWN. As we do not want any invites being thrown out into the builders' arena again for new bids.

 2. We need to concentrate our efforts now on the current proposals for a NON eco town (5000 normal brick house build), which is currently waiting to be reviewed by the District planning committee.

We still need to keep petitioning and building awareness, if you need a copy of the petition forms, then please contact fact@accamail.com

Richard Holloway

Chairman of FACT

Fradley Against Curborough Town

www.factinfo.co.uk

Add your comment

Your Name


Your Email (only if you are happy to have it on the site)


Your Comment - no HTML or weblinks


Enter this number in the box below and click Send - why?Unfortunately we have to do this to prevent the system being swamped by automated spam