GNLP2012

Felthorpe has very few facilities and services with this site being well away from the village centre. I therefore agree with the GNLP's own assessment that this site is unsuitable for development due to a prohibitive lack of access to services. This small, rural site is also likely to be economically unviable.

The village also suffers from significant rat running with hundreds of vehicles per day speeding down this narrow country lane to avoid the village centre. Development of this site would aggravate the current traffic issues.

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 a narrow country lane. The road 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. Development of this site would only add traffic.
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.
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.

Regarding the sites suggested for development in the parish of Felthorpe, Felthorpe Parish Council has the following comments to make:

General

Felthorpe Parish Council does not believe that Felthorpe is suitable for growth due to its lack of facilities. The village has no shop, no gas supply, no street lighting, narrow, uneven pavements, minimal employment and only two buses per day into Norwich. We believe that the majority of our parishioners support this view and enjoy a quieter, rural life.

The village already suffers from significant rat-running with peak hours traffic exceeding safe capacity of the narrow roads. Adding more traffic from a additional housing would add to these problems. Given the significant over-supply of land included in this consultation, we request that the many more suitable sites with better facilities are selected ahead of those in Felthorpe.

Brands Lane
The council agrees with the suitability assessment that the Brands Lane site is unsuitable for development due to its lack of access to facilities. We request that this site is not progressed further and is excluded from the Greater Norwich Plan.

Swannington Lane
While the council agrees with most of the suitability assessment for the Swannington Lane site, we believe that the Market Attractiveness criteria should be rated as red. It seems unlikely that a site with so few facilities would attract the required 10% premium for rural fringe sites. Mitigation for the other six amber criteria, including site access, local road network, waste water infrastructure and surface water flooding would be costly, rendering this site economically unviable. We therefore request that this site is not progressed further and is excluded from the Greater Norwich Plan.

I object in principle to any development being permitted on the following sites, for reasons of damage to the local landscape, loss of open green space, damage to wildlife habitat and further intrusion into and despoilation of the countryside in / around the existing settlements:-

0290
2027 (which appears to be the woodland 'garden' at the top of the hill running perpendicular to Fakenham Road? If so, whoever owns this ought to be ashamed of promoting it for development)
0457
0159
0062
2051
2012
0465
2106 (which is a 3.3 hectare site south of Taverham Rd, which was once a nursery but has been derelict for at least 50 years. The site is on chalk just below topsoil level and as such is likely to be of botanical interest. The fact that natural succession has been taking place over this site for so long means that it will almost certainly have acquired a large and diverse flora and fauna. Full ecological surveys must be carried out here. In addition to general ecological surveys, specific surveys for reptiles, amphibians and bats should be undertaken. The site is of great value as undisturbed green open space and should be preserved as such.

0284 (Old Costessey, 'Mann's' field - must be retained as green open space.
0206 (land adjoining) also must be retained as green open space
2004 - this seems to be part of the Tud marshes and shouldn't even be remotely considered for any kind of development, as shouldn't any of the rest of the Tud marshes (either on / adjacent to the golf course or between Longwater Lane and Townhouse Road).