We have lived on Caistor Lane for over twenty years. Our concerns are generally for the huge amount of development which in recent years has taken place in this area and the detrimental effect that this has already had on the quality of life in this community. Services are already stretched to capacity. There is no mention in the plans of increasing school places, nor of new doctors surgeries yet it is already increasingly difficult to get appointments at the doctors and schools are oversubscribed. This is before the huge amount of building already in process in the area is completed. How is it expected to cope with further development still?
Obviously the new developments have served to increase the volume of traffic in the area and all the roads, none of which are main roads, are becoming congested and dangerous.
Caistor St Edmund is described as a small rural community, yet is becoming anything but. This development will continue the suburbanisation of this lovely area and the character of each individual community will be lost as it becomes one sprawling housing development.
Caistor Lane is a LANE, just about wide enough for two cars to pass and in places, if cars are large as many now are, not even wide enough for this. The amount of traffic now using the lane has increased several fold due to the continued development of Poringland. When the large new estate at the top of Caistor Lane was built (250 houses) and concerns expressed about the further increase in traffic that this would lead to, we were told that the traffic coming from the new estate would not generally use Caistor Lane, but would turn right out of the estate and use the Norwich Road. As we all knew would be the case, this has not happened as Caistor Lane is a cut through to the A140 and A47. It has become increasingly dangerous to drive, particularly as many now drive beyond the speed limit and in the middle of the road. The suggested new development of 180 houses with access only onto Caistor Lane will further exacerbate this already big problem.
Additionally, the lane is becoming dangerous to walk.There are no pavements, nor is there any street lighting. Caistor Lane is home to many elderly residents and is used by an increasing number of young children due to the recent building at the Poringland end of the lane. To reach the services of the area without a car, it is necessary to walk to Poringland, up Caistor Lane. Anyone in a wheelchair, pushing a buggy or using a walking stick, has to walk on the road and these are the people least able to move out of the way of the speeding traffic.
We are lucky in this area to have access to some beautiful walks easily accessible from our homes, particularly around High Ash Farm but to access these, have to walk down Caistor Lane, a walk which is blighted by volume of traffic and the need to stop to allow it to pass. 180 new homes will significantly add to this problem. The proposal for a County Park in this development will only serve to further increase the traffic on this lane as again, access to it would be from Caistor Lane. Without any further development, there would be no need for any County Park as Whitlingham Country Park is very close and as previously mentioned, we already have access to walks. Finally, why do we need this development when houses already built are remaining empty?