Upcoming Cabinet (Housing Delivery) Committee meeting (22 May)

The next Cabinet (Housing Delivery) Committee meeting will be on Wednesday 22 March at 10am in the Walton Suite, Guildhall, Winchester. Meeting documents have been published yesterday on the Committee's meeting web page.

Amongst other business the appropriation of land in Abbotts Barton is on the agenda. (“Appropriation” is the process by which the Council formally changes the purpose for which a piece of land is held, from one purpose to another.)

The Council is currently considering bringing forward the first three sites at Abbots Barton for potential development, namely Dyson Drive, Hillier Way and Charles Close - two of these (Dyson Drive and Charles Close) are the sites that the residents in Abbotts Barton are most concerned about!

We still have not heard back from the council about the sites that many Abbotts Barton residents would prefer to be used for new houses instead of the parkland:

• 'Cadet site' - the council keeps saying they would most likely not succeed if they would start a planning application for that site and questioned about that, promised they would look into this matter further.
• Garages - we were promised by the council that they would look into the usage of the garages (who uses them, how many are used in total, what are they used for) and then they would decide how many can be replaced by houses and if they could possibly leave some or offer other parking and storage facilities.

These questions came up in February, more than two months ago.

As per the document on the meeting page, the next steps to be taken by the council would be these:

"For open space land, the appropriation process is commenced by advertising the intention to appropriate the land for planning purposes for 2 consecutive weeks. Any representations received must be considered by the Council before any decision to appropriate is taken. It is proposed that a formal report is brought to Members at a later date, when the decision on whether the Council should proceed with the
proposed appropriations can be taken.

This report therefore seeks authority to commence the appropriation process through the advertising of the Council’s intention to appropriate the land indicated at Dyson Drive, Hillier Way and Charles Close."

The attached maps in the document show which areas are under discussion for appropriation, the area in the main park stretches over what is about a third of the parkland!

Please contact the Winchester City Council if you have any concerns about these plans. Contact details can be found on the Action! tab. It is also possible to go to the meeting and voice your concerns there!