Draft Greater Norwich Local Plan – Part 1 The Strategy

Honingham Parish Council object to Honingham being grouped together with Easton and as such being classified as part of the Urban Fringe. Honingham is a small rural parish with extremely limited services and there should remain a clear distinction between it and surrounding villages. There is no shop, school, doctors or regular bus service in the village. It is not sustainable to consider the village capable of supporting the proposed increase in houses, alongside this the potential for further future development which this classification as Urban Fringe would lead to. Honingham should be considered separately from Easton, having only been grouped with Easton due to school catchments. Many of the school aged children in the village do not attend school at Easton, and travel to other destinations, therefore this grouping is not reflective of the real situation. This grouping also does not take into account the other locations residents have to travel to to utilise services such as shops or doctors which covers a far wider area, thus demonstrating further the unsustainable nature of development larger than 2-3 homes in the village.
By grouping Honingham with Easton this provides the opportunity to further build upon the countryside in the area, destroying the green space west of Norwich and the clear distinction between urban and rural.

Honingham Parish Council support the policy of small scale housing development where this is no more than 3 houses. The Council particularly support infill housing where the houses built are sympathetic to the rural nature of the village. This size of development is sustainable and would support the community without putting undue pressure on local services which are already struggling, and which residents already have to travel outside of the parish to use. There are no services in the village to sustain growth any larger than 3 houses.