Felthorpe is a small rural village with no shops, no schools or doctors, just a pub. With the only major employer going in liquidation and 2 buses available only in the morning, per day, having a car is fundamental. Even though the NDR was built we still have over 4000cars pass through our village roads a day. The proposed site access is via to the current field gate, which is up a bank from a blind bend on a narrow country lane. Swannington Lane is too narrow to be able to put a footpath, therefore makes it very difficult for pedestrians to access the few village facilities. Even more so, there is no street lights and because Felthorpe has no mains gas, it is frequented by many LPG/oil bowsers including large timber lorries which usually exceed the 30mph limit. Development of this site would only add traffic and create a new collision hotspot at the entrance to the site, besides increasing the one at the village entrance (the narrow Yew Tree bends on Taverham Road) which often experience minor collisions, most of which go unreported.
Electricity supply is via overhead wires and in the last two months alone I experienced 4 power cuts. Despite provided with the Fibre Unlimited broadband with average download speed of 36mb/s, on a good day I only hit 11mbs/s but on average it is much lower due to poor quality connection with several interruptions. Village waste water capacity is already insufficient, frequently overwhelming the pumping station and depositing sewage on the lawn of a property at the end of Chapel Lane. Without significant improvements to site drainage, it seems probable that parts of this site would also be at risk of surface water flooding or would aggravate problems at 22 & 24 Taverham Road who already experienced a flood on 23rd Jun 2016. The behaviour of local deer population will be affected, often these are seen on this site as it adjoins a large woodland plantation, where wildlife can move freely in and out of the nearby county wildlife sites.
Giving all the reasons above, Felthorpe should not be considered for development growth, considering significant mitigation works is required to make this site attractive to the market. There are other sites submitted in this plan that already have the facilities required and therefore make them more viable.