County call for new road priority in Vision 2031
Tuesday, 2nd July 2013.
Suffolk County Council’s cabinet meets next week to give its response to St Edmundsbury’s Vision 2031 documents, including the one for Haverhill.
A report to the council recommends in general that it approves the documents as being ‘sound’, one of the tests which a Government planning inspector will eventually put them to.
However, the county is asking for greater clarity on the issue of Haverhill’s northern relief road.
This is road which would link the Meadowlands roundabout with the A143 near the Fox (formerly the Rising Sun) at Little Wratting.
The county says this road must be built before any of the proposed north-eastern development of 2,500 houses is begun, because otherwise the traffic congestion generated could not be coped with by the current road network.
At present, the road is seen as a distributor for the north-western development of 1,150 houses, to be built as and when funds from developers of those sites come forward.
A north-eastern relief road included in the first stages of the plans was thrown out then because it would have cut across the golf course.
Because all traffic from the north-eastern development – beyond Chalkstone Way – would therefore have to use the north-western distributor, the county says it is essential to that development.
Other than that, the county feels all the traffic pressures in Haverhill can be mitigated planning conditions and obligations. It mentions the inclusion in the plan of a hope for a faster bus service to Cambridge and Stansted, which it also approves.
It suggests several additional extra paragraphs of text about resolving traffic problems in Bury St Edmunds which it says the Bury Vision 2031 document will not resolve.
The report also suggests county council input into aspirations for the development of the Bury and Haverhill town centres.
Later on its agenda, the council’s cabinet will consider a contribution of £1million over 25 years towards the Cambridge-Huntingdon A14 Project.
A report to the council recommends in general that it approves the documents as being ‘sound’, one of the tests which a Government planning inspector will eventually put them to.
However, the county is asking for greater clarity on the issue of Haverhill’s northern relief road.
This is road which would link the Meadowlands roundabout with the A143 near the Fox (formerly the Rising Sun) at Little Wratting.
The county says this road must be built before any of the proposed north-eastern development of 2,500 houses is begun, because otherwise the traffic congestion generated could not be coped with by the current road network.
At present, the road is seen as a distributor for the north-western development of 1,150 houses, to be built as and when funds from developers of those sites come forward.
A north-eastern relief road included in the first stages of the plans was thrown out then because it would have cut across the golf course.
Because all traffic from the north-eastern development – beyond Chalkstone Way – would therefore have to use the north-western distributor, the county says it is essential to that development.
Other than that, the county feels all the traffic pressures in Haverhill can be mitigated planning conditions and obligations. It mentions the inclusion in the plan of a hope for a faster bus service to Cambridge and Stansted, which it also approves.
It suggests several additional extra paragraphs of text about resolving traffic problems in Bury St Edmunds which it says the Bury Vision 2031 document will not resolve.
The report also suggests county council input into aspirations for the development of the Bury and Haverhill town centres.
Later on its agenda, the council’s cabinet will consider a contribution of £1million over 25 years towards the Cambridge-Huntingdon A14 Project.
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