Tuesday 12 May 2009

'Former Reservoir Is A Green Lung'

A public meeting has been organised for 7.30pm on Wednesday 13th May in the Downshire Square Church Hall prior to a consultation on revised plans to develop the Bath Road reservoir site.

The plans for the 5.4 acres site will be exhibited in the same building on Thursday 14th & Saturday 16th May.

According to Thames Water, the reservoir will be made redundant later this year and the site is ideally located for additional housing needs.

Following rejection of an earlier plan for 120 homes, Kennet Properties are due in June to submit an application outlining proposals for 96 new homes.

Conservative candidate Alok Sharma explained his objections, "the ‘new’ plans will not be fundamentally different from those previously submitted and they clearly have not taken into account the view of the community."

Local campaigners said that over the course of 150 years in active service the reservoir has been isolated from human contact, in the process developing into a wildlife haven where deer, badgers, birds and numerous other species have made themselves a natural home.

They also claim the site is not viable and proposals to devlop it for housing contradicts the definition of sustainable development - not least because it will mean more cars so close to the air quality management area (AQMA) at the Bath Road/Tilehurst Road junction.

"Local people would very much like to see this site preserved and used as a community wide resource," according to the Save The Bath Road Reservoir Campaign coordinators, Mel Woodward, Sarah Hayter and Graham Griffiths.

The online petition is still open if you wish to register your opposition to the plans, but it is also important to make it a worthwhile exercise by participating in the consultation and making sure the developers know the views of residents.

For more information visit the Save the Bath Rd Reservoir campaign site.

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Update: We know where Adrian Windisch get's his news.

1 comment:

  1. the site was put into the Borough Plan for housing in the 90s and signed off by councillors, including me (unrepentant) and one M. Salter, who is corporately responsible as deputy leader of the council at the time

    ReplyDelete




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