Threats From Development – Focus

Design Aim

"find ways to improve my knowledge concerning ecology and campaigning to save our natural heritage from planning applications"

 

“The tragic reality is that very few sustainable systems are designed or applied by those who hold power, and the reason for this is obvious and simple: to let people arrange their own food, energy and shelter is to lose economic and political control over them. We should cease to look to power structures, hierarchical systems, or governments to help us, and devise ways to help ourselves.”
Bill Mollison

Problem

 

On the 16th of August 2023, I received a letter from the North Yorkshire Council informing me they have received an application for full planning permission for a residential development of 28 dwellings and associated infrastructure on the land that my house looks onto. The letter from the planning officer told me I had until the 6th of September for the council to consider any comments I may wish to make in writing to them. 

The date to make comments was then extended until the 20th of September after a complaint was submitted over the short period in which to comment.

I attended a council meeting held in Richmond town hall in late August. The people in the houses over the other side of the field from me had formed a “Friends of Bolton Crofts” group to oppose the development of the proposed planning application. At the council meeting, a representative of this group addressed the councillors and members of the public by reading from a letter they had put together objecting to the development.

Their report was extremely professional taking the time to highlight the following concerns:

  • Sustainability and Accessibility
  • Housing Supply and Affordable Housing
  • Heritage
  • Environment and Ecology
  • Drainage     

The meeting concluded with the town council fully supporting the statement and strongly objecting to the Planning application. The council advised that this would be a hard fight and that everybody needed to write their own letters objecting to the planning application.

I left the meeting inspired yet at the same time seeds of doubt had been sown as to whether we could make a difference to those who have all the money in a world in which money talks the loudest.

I was fortunate to be on holiday from work for the first two weeks of September, this was when I planned to write my letter. Leading up to this I felt I had nothing to add, my knowledge of all things to do with building houses was none non-existent and the more of the letters from other residents that I read on the planning portal objecting only confirmed my lack of knowledge.

After much deliberation, I concluded that I could only write about the things I knew something about. The path I took with my letter was to give a voice to the field from an ecology perspective. Much to my surprise after a week of writing the letter it was received very well by those who read it that were also objecting to the planning application.  

In the weeks leading up to the end date of submitting objection letters, I helped with an information table at the Saturday outdoor market where a few of us talked with locals about the planning application. I also helped with a petition that my neighbour had running on a table at the end of her garden next to the snicket that runs to town. The weather when we were doing this in September was the best of the year and I talked with so many interesting people I had a great time being off work on holiday.  

From a personal perspective the campaigning process that I found myself involved with highlighted many gaps in my knowledge base as well as who to ask for help from. I reached out to lots of people whose work I looked up to and who had inspired me over the years but very few even acknowledged my request for help. So far, this experience has been a major learning curve for me and for this design, I would like to focus on the areas that interest me which I know little about and to be better prepared for when I get involved with more campaigning in the future.

To summarize the focus of this design, I would like to find ways to improve my knowledge concerning ecology and campaigning to save our natural heritage from planning applications.

Design Aim

 

"find ways to improve my knowledge concerning ecology and campaigning to save our natural heritage from planning applications"