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Loss of a Stockton Heath green field


minty

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Shouldn't this land be reserved for the approach road to a new high level road crossing over the Manchester Ship Canal?

The field and the boarded up detatched house were both 'reserved' for the new bridge for many years :!:

 

As it's not needed now they'd rather build on it than to allow it to stay a field :roll:

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The field and the boarded up detatched house were both 'reserved' for the new bridge for many years

I'm amazed that the (detached) house hasn't been taken over by squatters a long time ago.How come they knocked down the 2 houses that were next to it but left that one standing?

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Actually Chrissy based on the rules, he was entitled to claim it. The fact that the rules are totally wrong is another matter, and one that needs sorting sharpish to stop this sort of thing continuing. :wink:

 

PS He is actually a very good campaigner, and was born and went to school in Stockton Heath.

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Whilst I can understand the view that humans are more important than wildlife, if humans could sort out housing in a logical and sane manner there would be far less need to argue about where to build anyway. We can't keep contributing to the extinction of wildlife because of crass politics and decision making. There are thousands of homes standing empty-for a variety of reasons, supermarkets hold massive landbanks to stop competition and a lot of new build is very poorly built and won't stand the test of time.

This credit crunch may force us all to review the British obsession with home ownership. Many of us only wanted to own a property because we thought values would steadily rise and we might be able to pass something onto our children to help them. If that is no longer a good strategy perhaps renting will become popular again. Most other Europeans think we're a bit crazy to want to buy a property!

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No,most of us just want a place to live that we can call our own & do what we like to it.

With the rental regulations in parts of Europe you can do just that. ie. long term tenancy agreements.

Also, years ago council housing used to offer a home for life and within, the boundaries of planning regs, tenants could update and improve as they wished.

I think security of tenure was the crucial factor of people buying a property - 'it's mine and no-one can take it away from me', but sadly in an uncertain world repossession always has to be considered a possiblity.

Shelley - are the proposed rented homes ring fenced for people on the housing list, or are they meant to be available to anyone?

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I read the news item on todays WW. The general tenor of the article seemed to portray most residents of Stockton Heath as snobbish prats who are more concerned about their own property value than they are about people in housing need...

 

 

... so it was spot on there then :!:

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McBain

What a totally imature comment. People all over Warrington are objecting to over-development and loss of open spaces. Obviously, I no idea where you live but your post smacks of the past where, to live south of the canal, you were branded a "toffee nosed" so and so. Times have changed!!!

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I read the news item on todays WW. The general tenor of the article seemed to portray most residents of Stockton Heath as snobbish prats who are more concerned about their own property value than they are about people in housing need...

 

 

... so it was spot on there then :!:

 

Wrong McB although from the headline I can understand your confusion......

 

The issue here is the fact that a well used piece of open green space (or whatever you like to call it) is being sold off by WBC for a housing development :evil:

 

It's not snobbery and it's irrelevant that it is for so called 'affordable' housing as even if it was a a batch of ?1/2 million propeties people would still feel the same. THEY WANT TO KEEP THEIR FIELD... what's wrong with that :roll: !!

 

The only people who will benefit are WBC for selling the land and the housing association for getting rental income on the properties plus of course the boxes that will be ticked :wink: .

 

The sad thing is that if it is approved being rented accomodation it's not really helping to get people on the property ladder at all is it, it's just giving them a place to live that will never really be their own :cry::roll:

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Dis - the Council's estates section has a statutory obligation to achieve the best possible return for any land it sells. Once the decision to sell had been made (and I am not clear how that actually happened) a sale to a housing developer (of whatever flavour) was a foregone conclusion.

 

Given that this sort of thing seems to create an inherent tension between Council departments (Parks & Landscapes should be fighting to keep them whereas Estates should be fighting to sell them) I wonder about the internal Council mechanisms by which these sorts of issues are thrashed out. Are the minutes of such meetings available for public scrutiny :?: Are the public allowed to attend these meetings :?:

 

Maybe they should be :idea:

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Dis - the Council's estates section has a statutory obligation to achieve the best possible return for any land it sells. Once the decision to sell had been made (and I am not clear how that actually happened) a sale to a housing developer (of whatever flavour) was a foregone conclusion.

 

Given that this sort of thing seems to create an inherent tension between Council departments (Parks & Landscapes should be fighting to keep them whereas Estates should be fighting to sell them) I wonder about the internal Council mechanisms by which these sorts of issues are thrashed out. Are the minutes of such meetings available for public scrutiny :?: Are the public allowed to attend these meetings :?:

 

Maybe they should be :idea:

 

Hiya McB

 

If the minutes are available for public scritiny then they are certainly not available online (unless I am looking in the wrong place for the wrong piece of land :roll: )

 

If, like you say, there is already an inherent tension between council departments over such issues then where on earth does that leave 'Joe Public' who has to put up with, and live with, a decision made by some dim wits from out of the area and in private behind closed doors :?: (I am talking in general here and not just about this one field)

 

Ok so as a 'land owner' a person is fully entiltled to sell their own land if they wish but in the case of WBC they are nothing more that TEMPORARY land owners in charge of land that changes ownership depending on which leading party (owner) is in charge......

 

Unfortunately we still have the same incumbants as last time who need to rake in as much revenue as possible to fill their rather large black hole in whatever way they can. :roll:

 

How soon will it be before residents across the whole of Warrington find out that every spare bit of land owned by the council is being sold off to the highest bidder due to so called 'statutory obligations' :evil:

 

No wonder WBC in their recent 'survey' were asking RESIDENTS to let them know of any unused and spare pieces of land in the borough :roll::wink:

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:lol: Nothing wrong with being forthright in your views Dis.

 

I couldn't make the meeting, but in any event I am afraid that experience has left a wide streak of cynicism in me when it comes to Warrington "consultation" exercises. Too often they are not about consultation, rather they are just to disseminate information - there is a huge difference but it is not one that WBC is aware of :roll:

 

I still maintain that the mechanism by which Council land disposals are determined is somewhat opaque - particularly as I haven't a clue which committee (assuming there is one) acts as oversight for these sorts of decisions.

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Report on todays front page news re some affordable houses in Culcheth.

 

The proposed location requires it to be approves as a Rural Exception Site first. Never heard of that before but now I've read what it is it's worrying.

 

Basically it allows for Affordable Housing to be built on rural sites (farm land, fields etc) where normal housing development would NOT be allowed due to planning policy etc.

 

As Warrington suddenly has a shortfall of 419 affordable houses PER YEAR :?: with no-where to build them due to developers nabbing every spare inch of land going :evil:........ will we soon be losing more and more of the surrounding open space and fields which we thought were safeguarded from developement :shock::evil:

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The Affordable Housing situation is documented in the Strategic Housing Market Assessment (finally available to you for the princely sum of ?58?75). The SHMA calls for 40% of all new housing permitted to be Affordable - but the demand for affordable housing is prompting a lot of head-scratching at the Council. There is a general recognition that without significant amounts of new building, both by the private sector and the Council itself, this demand will go unmet year-on-year.

 

As for your question Dis, I suspect that Greenfield sites have always been the most attractive proposition for affordable housing providers because the overheads associated with having to decontaminate the site etc. are not applicable: virgin land is easy land to develop :!: I doubt however that there will be an 'explosion' of affordable house building on greenfield sites, there isn't a great deal of money to be made in providing AH and that will always be a limiting factor...

 

...However, there is a lot of money to be made in 'retirement homes / sheltered accommodation' etc. and so you will undoubtedly see more of these sorts of applications coming forward, particularly in light of the general demographic that shows that there are going to be way more old, dementia-suffering people around shortly than ever before :shock:

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As for your question Dis, I doubt however that there will be an 'explosion' of affordable house building on greenfield sites, there isn't a great deal of money to be made in providing AH and that will always be a limiting factor...:

 

But surely thats the point McB. Affordable housing isn't about making money it's about providing certain levels of affordable housing as laid out by government rules and the like.

 

Now brown field site developments etc ARE about making money. The developer rakes in money and the council gets its 106 agreement handouts and if they are luck enough to own the land they get the money from the sale of it aswell :wink: . So building affordable housing on these sites would not be cost effective whereas building on a rural/greenfield site where a normal developer has no chance of getting approval could be seen as the better option all round :shock:

 

If a developer cannot/will not (for whatever reason) supply the required percentage of affordable housing in their new developement they just hand over a % of money which then has to go towards affordable housing elsewhere in the borough. This is then topped up by housing assocation grants, government funding etc etc.

 

The daft thing is that there are so many houses and appartments on the market in Warrington which are just not selling. Perhaps the housing associations/council should buy some of those before they go building everywhere. :roll:

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[quote="Dismayed"

 

The daft thing is that there are so many houses and appartments on the market in Warrington which are just not selling. Perhaps the housing associations/council should buy some of those before they go building everywhere. ]

 

But the Housing Associations have the same problem as the Council, don't they?

Government funded? :?

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But the Housing Associations have the same problem as the Council, don't they?

Government funded? :?

 

Not sure I follow you there Peter :?

 

If they have money available to build new affordables and to buy land then they have money available to buy existing houses. I think :P

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Dis - Affordable Homes have to meet quite strict design criteria in order to attract grant funding. The majority of vacant, privately-owned properties will not satisfy these criteria and so are not attractive to Housing Associations. This is one why Housing Associations do not buy up the apartments etc. that are not being let at present.

 

Funny, greenfield sites are the best option for Housing Associations to construct Affordable Housing on, but people who live near such (empty) greenfield sites will howl protests at the mere thought of an "affordable" scheme being brought forward on land near them :!: Oh yes, everyone agrees that those in need should be housed... just not near me! :lol:

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So what you are saying McB is it ok for people to somehow manage to BUY this sort of home but unfortunately the same home does not meet the strict criteria for affordable homes :shock: Bit of a kick in the teeth for those who try their best to get on the housing ladder in the normal way to be told they are living in a sub standard home which even the housing association would not touch for homeless people eh?

 

and..... greenfield sites are SUPPPOSED to be EMPTY that's why they are called 'green' + 'field'. :roll::P

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