York: Historic city’s planning vision delayed until 2014 after hitch

Detailed plans for the Local Development Framework’s (LDF) core strategy for York were withdrawn in May by the city council just three months after they had been submitted to the Government for final approval.

A total of £1.1m of taxpayers’ money has been ploughed in to developing the documents since March 2006, but York Council took the decision not to pursue the plan after Government planning inspector David Vickery raised concerns over its “potential soundness”.

York Council has now confirmed that an overhauled planning document, which will shape development over the next two decades, will not be in place until the end of 2014 at the earliest.

The Government has issued new planning policies which will mean LDFs will be replaced with more streamlined documents called Local Plans.

However, senior officers at the Guildhall in York are adamant that data collated during the six years of work to develop the city’s LDF will be used as a foundation for a new Local Plan.

The council’s assistant director for strategic planning and transport, Richard Wood, confirmed the seven-figure sum had been spent on drawing up the LDF and had been used to fund an action plan for the city centre, and a wide-ranging public consultation.

The money was also used to finance planning guidance for key development sites, such as the vacant British Sugar factory and York Central, which is one of the nation’s largest brownfield locations.

Mr Wood added: “This work has also supported planning applications and major development projects. The majority of the work – particularly the consultation undertaken and evidence based studies produced to support the LDF – will certainly be used to support future spatial plans for the city.”

The council’s Local Development Framework Group chaired by the cabinet member for transport, planning and sustainability, Coun Dave Merrett, will meet on Monday next week to take the first steps to shape the city’s 
Local Plan. A proposed timescale has been set out which will see a set of preferred options drawn up by March next year before a two-month period of consultation.

The proposed document will then be finalised before another consultation in February and March of 2014. The draft strategy will then be examined for at least seven months and is not expected to be adopted until at least the end of that year. The report outlining the proposals to draw up the Local Plan will go before a cabinet meeting in October.

The council confirmed in May this year that the LDF’s core strategy had been withdrawn in the wake of a decision to approve plans for one of the city’s most contentious developments of recent years.

The council’s planning committee gave the go-ahead earlier that month for the Monks Cross development, which will create a 6,000-seat community sports stadium to become the new home of York City Football Club and York City Knights rugby league team. A hugely contentious retail scheme for showpiece retailers including Marks & Spencer and John Lewis, which opponents claim will harm city centre trade, will help finance the stadium with nearly £15m.

Coun Merrett maintained that changes to national planning policy had also led to the decision to withdraw the core strategy. The Government has announced that LDFs are due to be replaced with over-arching Local Plans which will provide one document to set out planning policies.

Following an analysis of the LDF documents after a meeting with the council in April, Mr Vickery voiced concerns over whether ambitious housebuilding targets for 800 homes a year would be met.