Cathedral/Vivid Development: My thoughts on the application

As many residents will be aware, Guildford Cathedral and the housing developer Vivid submitted their planning application for 124 homes on the slopes of the Cathedral to Guildford Borough Council. Consultation on the application is still open and comments need to be submitted no later than 28th January.

I have looked over the planning application, read comments from its potential neighbours and spoken to the Onslow councillors. I am disappointed and concerned by the application and I wanted to share some of my reasons why.

Through my time in politics (approximately 15 years now) I have been clear - I believe in the need to build homes to meet an area's need, providing they are the right homes, in the right places, with the right infrastructure. My other caveat is that new developments must take into account the needs and character of the community/ies that they will become part of.

Infrastructure

Anyone who lives between the Cathedral roundabout and the town centre knows how heavy the traffic on The Chase/Madrid Road/Guildford Park Road often is - it regularly ends up gridlocked at peak periods. A 124 home development is inevitably going to result in additional car movements. The bulk of these will be funnelled along Alresford Road and Ridgemount (a single track road heavily used by pedestrians and cyclists) onto Guildford Park Road which will, of course, further exacerbate congestion in the area. Which in turn will increase already high levels of air pollution.

In contrast, five of the properties for Cathedral staff will have access/exit via a different route - the Cathedral's access road and directly onto the Cathedral roundabout.

Throughout the process of putting this development together, local residents have noted this and implored the developers and Cathedral to reconsider the access onto Guildford Park Avenue and instead enable all the homes to access/exit via the Cathedral access road. They have consistently been ignored and, my understanding is, not given any clear reason why this is not feasible.

Communities know and understand their local area better than anyone and it is crucial that developers listen - doing so has the potential to prevent mistakes being made that cannot be rectified further down the line.

Gas Boilers

I am very disappointed to see that the properties being built will have gas boilers. While these may be high efficiency they are still gas and new gas boilers will be banned in new-build homes from 2025. Why then are they being installed in these new homes just years before this date, thereby leaving homeowners to pick up the tab for the cost of replacing them rather than future-proofing these homes with new and greener options? (The average life expectancy of a boiler is 10-15 years.)

Affordable Housing

Guildford's Local Plan makes it clear that all but the smallest developments need to include 40% affordable housing. Sadly this development only includes 35% affordable housing and I'm also concerned to see that most of these are within blocks of flats. In contrast, the larger market homes and properties earmarked for the Cathedral are towards the top of the development and are built at a much lower density.

Affordable housing targets are there for a reason and absolutely should be met by developers. I also strongly believe that all developments should seek to mix affordable and market together seamlessly - doing so helps to ensure a thriving community and frankly, there is no reason not to.

I am aware that many other queries have been raised by local people regarding this development but these are the stand-out issues for me. Honestly, I wish that I could be more positive because, as I said at the start, I believe that we need to be building homes but not if crucial issues such as affordability, infrastructure and environmental impact are not being appropriately addressed.

I encourage Guildford residents, especially those living between the Cathedral and Farnham Road to look over the application and submit their comments.

To review the application and submit a comment click here [https://www2.guildford.gov.uk/publicaccess/applicationDetails.do?activeTab=summary&keyVal=_GUILD_DCAPR_197347]. They are accepting comments until Friday 28th January.