Portland Centre Consultation - URGENT

Portland Centre Plans	The Portland Centre site has been acquired by the David Wilson Homes division of Barratt Homes.
Consultation	A consultation event was held on Monday 18 March at which drawings of a proposed site plan for detailed planning permission were displayed. David Wilson Homes have an open consultation process and invite comments. The deadline for comment is 1st April.
Link to plans and Consultation Feedback	David Wilson Homes Consultation. The e-mail address for feedback is feedback@consultation-online.co.uk Telephone for feedback (given on printed feedback form) 0800 298 7040
NWENF Comment	The NWENF is NOT taking an "official" view on this. The comments here are what some people have said as private individuals. The plans which DWH have drawn up are in many ways an improvement on the outline planning permission which the Council "granted themselves".  That is, the houses in this latest site plan are more attractive as an asset to the neighbourhood. But these plans fail to take into account the local opinion expressed in various ways during the past 2 years.
Specific Comments	*  Many people are disappointed that the departments of the Birmingham City Council have passed on to David Wilson Homes this outline Planning Permission for such a high number of houses.  This ignores the feedback through a variety of channels during the past 2 years; these include the residents meetings, and hundreds of responses sent to former Councillor John Alden when he canvassed the area following the original flawed consultation exercise by DTZ. *  Area plans (published by the Council) in the 2005 Unitary Development Plan proposed that this site should have a split of about 2/3 open space and 1/3 housing following the layout of areas occupied by the (former) school building and playing fields. *  The outline Planning Permission consolidated the open space towards The Ridgeway - good - but included a row of houses adjacent to The Ridgeway - bad because it reduces the open space. *  The new plans split the open space into 2 areas very much associated with the new housing, and in such a way that this looks "private" to the new housing estate. *  The children's play area in one of the open spaces was proposed (by some of the visitors to the display on 18 March) to be moved so that it is easily visible from Bernard Road. *The road layout, as proposed by Council departments and passed on to DWH, ignores previous public comment.  It makes an easy short cut from Portland Road to Bernard Road, to avoid the traffic lights at City Road.  Previous feedback comment said that this should be changed so that the through route through this site is very much longer, to discourage use as a "rat-run". *  Road safety issues - a)   The Portland Road entrance is too narrow to have a footway on both sides, which creates a safety problem whichever side the footway is on.  It may also be too narrow for the volume of traffic going in and out at peak times. b)   Residents on Bernard Road have expressed concern that this development will create a lot more traffic on Bernard Road - they want to Portland Road entrance to be the major access to the site, and the Bernard Road entrance to be a  minor access. c)   An idea considered by former Cllr Alden was whether the Scout Hut could be re-located, built to modern building standards, so that a one-way road system could be built for the Portland Road access.  Entrance on the present gateway, exit on the present Scout Hut site.  (Possibly financed by some of the Section 106 money.)  This would make the Portland Road access very much the major access compared with the Bernard Road access.  This one-way loop would make the Portland Road access very much safer for the probable volume of traffic compared with 2-way traffic on the present gateway.