Council chiefs pledge to protect green space from urban sprawl

Over the next eight weeks, 51,000 newspapers and 16,000 flyers will be delivered to homes across Harrogate, Ripon and Knaresborough, 3,000 letters will be sent to landowners and parish councils and six public exhibitions will take place over plans to build 390 homes a year throughout the area up to 2023-24 – to address a critical lack of affordable housing.

Critics have claimed the proposals are the biggest encroachment on the district’s green spaces for decades, with a significant proportion of the proposed sites selected by the council on greenfield land.

At a meeting yesterday (mon), Harrogate Borough Council planning bosses said they have been hindered where to choose the sites due to a lack of vacant brownfield land.

But they claimed more would be available in the coming years and were still hopeful of hitting a target of building the homes on 70 per cent brownfield land.

Dave Sykes, planning policy manager at the council, said: “In the past we were very fortunate with the availability of brownfield land that we had, to significantly reduce the amount on greenfield land.

“Now it is a significant proportion of greenfield sites.

“We have selected a lot of greenfield land but there will always be brownfield land coming through.

“We will always prioritise development on brownfield land first.

“This is a genuine consultation and a genuine chance for a debate - that is what we are wanting.”

Last year, consultation over building homes in the rural parts of the district such as Pateley Bridge and Pannal produced a wave of opposition to the plans, leading to the strategy being delayed so the council could effectively consider residents’ comments.

The eight-week consultation on proposals for urban areas across Harrogate, Ripon and Knaresborough is expected to stoke up similar controversy.

Critics have already complained that not enough is being done to address serious concerns over a lack of improvements to infrastructure to accompany the new homes, while the former cabinet member for planning, transport and economic development, Jim Clark, who oversaw the rural consultation, has described it as the biggest attack on the green space of Harrogate for years.

Coun Bill Hoult, the Liberal Democrat representative for Knaresborough on the county council, where 800 new homes are planned in the town as part of the consultation, claimed it would lead to an estimated 1,600 extra cars on its already choked roads degrading the quality of life for residents.

Yesterday, Harrogate Borough Council’s current cabinet member for planning, transport and economic development, Richard Cooper, stressed that the strategy will strike a good balance between providing much-needed affordable homes while making sure that parts of the district are not swamped by new housing developments.

“Infrastructure will be a part of any changes that go forward,” Coun Cooper said.

“We will build new schools and shops to support any developments.

“There will always be concerns when you build new houses but in terms of housing development this is the lowest level of growth in the past 40 years and the lowest level since Harrogate Council came into being.

“There is an affordable housing shortage in the district by quite some degree - people who grow up here, need to find somewhere to live.”

The latest round of consultation is expected to cost the taxpayer around £25,000, cheaper than in pervious years.

The results of the urban and rural areas consultation will be published next spring.