BABTAG Update

Villages still await measures to deter traffic through the villages
With 26 houses now occupied on the first new estate of Thorpebury the promised traffic mitigation measures for Barkby and Barkbythorpe still have not materialized but there are some signs of progress. County Highways officers have been seen in the villages checking the condition of the roads and the places where chicanes, road bumps, crossings and a white spot roundabout are likely to be sited. A representative of the developers, who will be funding the measures, will be setting out the full scheme at the Barkby and Barkby Thorpe parish council meeting in March. After that there still needs to be a public consultation and final approval from the County Highways Department so it will be some time before the villages get relief from Thorpebury generated traffic.
Barkbythorpe Road Issues
After months when HGVs were free to by-pass the new pinch on Barkbythorpe Road a gate has finally been manufactured and installed so in future the only big vehicles to get through will be fire engines, ambulances and farm vehicles. There is also to be a road safety audit of all the alterations along the road which will address the concerns voiced by BABTAG and others about the safety of single lane working at the southern chicane.
Southern Access Road
This road from the Sandhills roundabout on the Leicester ring road through Hamilton park to phase one of Thorpebury is in it’s detailed design stage though the sale of city council land, on which part of it will be built, to the developers has still not been agreed but BABTAG has learnt that the city has now appointed Savills to negotiate the price the city will sell at. Thorpebury will stall at 575 houses until the road is operational. Only then will phase two be permitted to go ahead with further housing development on both sides of Barkbythorpe Road and the beginnings of a spine road which will eventually link with Barkbythorpe Lane, a few hundred yards the eastern side of the Duckpond junction.
More news on Thorpebury
The new houses of phase one of Thorpebury will be car reliant until 175 houses have been occupied as it is only then that a bus service linking the estate to the city centre will be introduced.
As well as paying their council taxes, the new residents will face an annual charge of £244.89 to pay for the upkeep of all the verges, green spaces and sports and recreation fields though the charge will not apply until 2025.
Why the Charnwood Local Plan Examination in Public matters
Public hearings have been taking place this month into the Charnwood Local Plan before two government appointed inspectors who have to judge if the Plan is sound or unsound. The Plan matters as it proposes a number of sites just to the north and west of Barkby for 1500 houses, despite the area having already to accommodate the 4500 houses of Thorpebury. Owen Bentley, representing BABTAG and Barkby and Barkby Thorpe parish council, spoke at the hearings against these sites arguing that the council’s housing policies were inevitably leading to the coalescence of the local villages into an urban sprawl whilst it trumpeted a policy of green wedge and areas of separation. The Local Plan was therefore unsound by holding two polices in mutual contradiction.
It was instructive and worrying to note that BABTAG and Barkby and Barkby Thorpe parish council was alone in representing villages and action groups in a process that was dominated by representatives of housing developers.
Current moves for more houses
The Local Plan is looking to the future. In the here and now developers are taking advantage of Charnwood’s lack of a five year housing supply by submitting planning applications for 130 houses enclosing Inglenook Caravan Park on Barkbythore Lane, 90 houses south of the Rearsby by pass roundabout in Queniborough and 256 houses at East Goscote. This rather puts into perspective the recent and rare rejection of an application for 150 houses off Barkby Road in Queniborough.
Owen Bentley
Chairman BABTAG