Local plan scoping consultation

Comment

Representation ID: 4661

Received: 01/09/2026

Respondent: Mr Allan Carton

Assess the northern Green Belt as one block before the sites within it, and define and map the separations that must be kept as strategic green gaps. The submissions map shows promotions across its whole extent: Ashley, Yarwood Heath, Spodegreen Lane, Tatton Services, Bucklow Hill, High Legh, a very large area west of Knutsford and clusters at Mobberley, Ollerton and Marthall. Each will be assessed separately and none asks what remains once a proportion succeed. Establish the width below which each separation stops working. A gap can be lost without any decision ever having decided to lose it.

Comment

Representation ID: 4663

Received: 01/09/2026

Respondent: Mr Allan Carton

Test grey belt site by site against each Green Belt purpose, with promoter analysis tested independently, and publish the methodology of the assessment at 5.18 before its conclusions are relied on. Aerial imagery shows the promoted land at Ashley and west of Knutsford is continuous working farmland with no previously developed land. Evidence the alternatives at 5.17 first, publishing the capacity from brownfield, optimised density and sites outside the Green Belt. Where one owner promotes adjoining parcels, assess the combined release alongside each parcel. Do not draw a boundary to the alignment of an unconsented scheme.

Comment

Representation ID: 4664

Received: 01/09/2026

Respondent: Mr Allan Carton

Before the filter at 5.11 runs, establish agricultural land classification, airport safeguarding and public safety zones, heritage settings and ecological designations. Publish each site, its area, the promoter and, where boundaries sit inside one another, the net area assessed. At Ashley the map shows twelve sites, two withdrawn. Eight match parcels in a letter totalling 40.50 hectares. Two much larger quadrants appear to envelope them. The promoter publicly describes the live proposal as about 1,070 homes, which the map does not bear out. Verify the developable area behind any stated dwelling capacity.

Comment

Representation ID: 4665

Received: 01/09/2026

Respondent: Mr Allan Carton

Publish the tests a settlement must pass before it is treated as a strategic growth location, covering services, employment, health and education capacity, committed transport frequency, station and parking capacity and highway capacity. Paragraph 5.16 allows boundary change where development around stations is proposed, so publish criteria for that route based on the service a station actually provides. Ashley is a village washed over by Green Belt with an hourly train at risk of halving. A station exception turning on the existence of a platform would open Green Belt release at every rural halt.

Comment

Representation ID: 4666

Received: 01/09/2026

Respondent: Mr Allan Carton

Separate committed and funded schemes from aspirational ones. Do not credit accessibility benefits to schemes with no funded delivery route and account for service reductions in prospect. The Ashley promotion relies on Northern Powerhouse Rail and potential tram/train links, while the funded Cheadle station would cut Ashley from hourly to two-hourly, and Sundays are already two-hourly. Assess physical capacity too: lane widths, railway and river bridge crossings, pinch points, the A538 and M56 junctions and station parking. Identify and cost the works needed before any site is called deliverable.

Comment

Representation ID: 4668

Received: 01/09/2026

Respondent: Mr Allan Carton

The interactive site submissions map is welcome. It identifies no promoter and provides no supporting material, so residents can see where sites are and cannot see what is argued about them. Publish the documents submitted with each site, with the promoter named and a searchable index, before the next consultation stage. Record land withdrawn from a call for sites with the date and stated reason, and carry that record into the Green Belt boundary review. Withdrawal removes a site from assessment and leaves the promoter's stated intention for that land untouched.

Comment

Representation ID: 4669

Received: 01/09/2026

Respondent: Mr Allan Carton

Measure the effect of any Green Belt release on access to open countryside for people on the urban edge. For Hale, Hale Barns and Altrincham the Green Belt in Ashley parish is the nearest open land, and development on the scale promoted would roughly double the walk to reach it. That is the everyday value of the gap and it bears on the active travel and wellbeing objectives in this chapter as much as on Green Belt purposes.