HUNDREDS of outraged homeowners have attended a meeting to hear about a proposed housing development which could radically change the appearance of a small village.
East Staffordshire Borough Council plans to build up to 150 new homes in Rolleston over the next 20 years, but parishioners fear this figure could be significantly higher.
It was claimed during a public meeting, held in the village on Monday night, that the new homes were needed to cope with the region’s growing population.
In the borough council’s core strategy three options have been presented, ranging from 50 to 150 houses, and the only site put forward at the moment is college playing fields.
However, when a strategic housing land availability assessment was carried out, it found several potential sites including room for 180 homes on the college playing fields, 36 houses off Craythorne Road and Meadow View, and 225 houses off Walford Road, although none of these sites have been put forward in the core strategy.
Barry Edwards, chairman of Rolleston Parish Council, allayed people’s fears saying: “Just because certain areas have been identified as a potential development site, it does not mean they will be built on.
“The borough council wants to build so many houses and our main aim is to get the number reduced. The current situation is not entirely clear, but I know we do have to work with the council on this.
“As a community we have to decide what we want to do and set up a steering committee to deal with it.”
Ten members of the public nominated themselves as committee members and they will now put their heads together to come up with a neighbourhood development plan.
The plan will then be submitted to the borough council which could use it as guidance when deciding future planning applications in the village.
Another mammoth proposed development in the area includes plans for a 650- home plot south of Branston. The Beamhill Road site is the largest plot of land being eyed up for building work in East Staffordshire with 1,000 homes. An application was recently granted for 224- homes in Tutbury and a consultation is under way for up to 200 new houses in Barton under Needwood.
Pressure groups have been launched in recent months to fight large-scale housebuilding in the area, and an alliance of rural parish councils was formed to lobby for the scrapping of the house-building targets.
Town Hall chiefs, however, say population forecasts mean 13,000 new houses will be necessary over the next 20 years.
Four thousand of these houses will have to be built on previously untouched rural land.
