Example District Council - Issues and Options 2024
4. Meeting Example District's Sustainable Development Needs
Chapter 4 sets out various options as to how we might meet our development needs to 2050 (e.g. infrastructure, jobs and housing). The chapter is split into 2 sections and seeks your views on the following issues:
4.1 Example District's Development Requirements
- Issue I1: Sustainability Appraisal
- Issue I2: Infrastructure Requirements and delivery
- Issue I3: Community Infrastructure Levy (CIL)
- Issue I4: Infrastructure Safeguarding
- Issue I5: Viability and Deliverability
4.2 Development distribution strategy for Example District
- Issue S1: Green & Blue Corridors
- Issue S2: Intensification
- Issue S3: Using Brownfield Land for development
- Issue S4: Growth of existing settlements
- Issue S5: The potential for new settlement(s)
- Issue S6: A review of Green Belt boundaries
- Issue S7: Refined Spatial Growth Options
- Issue S8: Small scale development outside of the chosen spatial growth option
- Issue S9: Settlement boundaries and infill development
- Issue S10: Any other development strategy issues
4.1 Example District's Development Requirements
The primary role of the Local Plan is to promote a sustainable pattern of development that seeks to meet the needs of Example District, align growth and infrastructure, improve the environment, mitigate climate change and adapt to its effects.
To understand Example District's development needs a sub-regional Housing and Economic Development Needs Assessment or HEDNA has been undertaken based on up-to-date information from the 2021 census.
The HEDNA provides evidence about how many jobs we should seek to create by 2050 and then how many homes will be needed to house the workers for those jobs. The detail of these requirements is included at Chapters 5 and 6 of this Issues and Options document. However, in order to deliver growth, it is critical that we seek to address the infrastructure implications associated with new development.
Issue I1: Sustainability Appraisal
A Sustainability Appraisal (SA) is an essential component in the production of the Local Plan, informing and influencing plan preparation to optimise its sustainable development performance.
To help ensure that the Local Plan includes the most suitable planning policies and development allocations, the sustainability appraisal identifies, describes and evaluates a number of different reasonable alternative policies and development locations.
An SA has been prepared to support the Issues and Options Consultation which explores the following reasonable alternatives as part of the plan making process:
- 5 Growth Options which provide details about where development should be distributed at a strategic scale across the Example District area
- 7 New Settlement Locations for large-scale development of not less that 6,000 new homes and associated infrastructure
- 32 Broad Locations which represents options for up to 2,000 homes located around the main settlements for medium scale development and associated infrastructure in any one Broad Location
- 22 Small Settlement locations for intermediate scale development for between 50-500 homes in any one location, typically associated with smaller settlements and villages.
- 88 Policy alternative options for shaping the relevant policies. Subjects include for example climate change, tourism and health.
The appraisal process uses an SA Framework to evaluate how the different reasonable alternatives perform against sustainability objectives. It provides a way in which sustainability effects can be described, analysed and compared.
Evaluation of the Broad Locations, Small Settlements, Growth Options and New Settlements all include a summary of best performing options. At this stage it is difficult to identify stand out best performing options because they all perform best for different SA Objectives and rarely does one option emerge as a best overall option.
It is however possible to begin to identify consistently, poor-performing options and these should be possibly removed from further consideration.
The SA process will take on board any comments on the SA and use them to furnish the next report with greater detail and accuracy.
Table 1 - SA Key for presenting likely impacts
Likely Impact |
Description |
Impact Symbol |
---|---|---|
Major Positive Impact |
The proposed option contributions to the achievement of the SA Objective to a significant extent. |
++ |
Minor Positive Impact |
The proposed option contributions to the achievement of the SA Objective to some extent. |
+ |
Negligible Impact |
The proposed option has no effect or an insignificant effect on the achievement of the SA Objective. |
0 |
Uncertain Impact |
The proposed option has an uncertain relationship with the SA Objective or insufficient information is available for an appraisal to be made. |
+/- |
Minor Adverse Impact |
The proposed option prevents the achievement of the SA Objective to some extent. Mitigation solutions are achievable, and or complex, with a relatively low level of intervention. |
- |
Major Adverse Impact |
The proposed option prevents the achievement of the SA Objective to a significant extent. Mitigation solutions are likely to be complex, if at all possible. A high level of intervention is required. |
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Q-I1: Please add any comments you wish to make about the Sustainability Appraisal, indicating clearly which element of the appraisal you are commenting on. Comment