Local Development Framework Consultation

Oppose

We attended the meeting at Levens Institute on the 13th May 2008 when a representative of SLDC was present to give further information regarding the proposed plan for Levens. This meeting was arranged by the Parish Council as there are grave concerns, within the village, regarding the above plans.
Whilst there may be the need to provide 8,800 new houses in South Lakeland up to 2025, we would state that the need will not be met by over developing a small village and we would suggest that a small number of affordable houses or sheltered accomodation for the elderly can be met by using other small sites in Levens. That would enhance the village rather than your proposed site, which would no doubt be over developed by builders/developers.
The proposed site is East Levens and we suggest that there are other alternatives to be considered.
* An empty carpet shop, on a large site, that has been
empty some time.
* Land that has an empty stable/half finished dwelling to the
North of Levens.
* Two plots of land on Lowgate.
* Land owned by the Parish Council which is already being
investigated for possible buildings.
These would be smaller groups of dwellings which would be more in keeping with the village rather than a sprawling estate.
Our reasons for only a small development are:
* All roads into Levens have poor access.
* Poor access into sites from Greengate and Greengate
Crescent especially for heavy building lorries.
* Poor electricity supply with frequent power cuts any time
of the year.
* Poor water pressure and inadequate/waste water
sewerage.
The utilities providers may maintain that they provide adequate services but this is not the reality, as many residents voiced their concerns at the meeting.
The core strategy preferred options notes that there is a daily bus service but this is inadequate for employees to rely on to travel to and from work. So each occupier will need at least one car, many families now have two, and this would result in unacceptable pressure on the already inadequate village roads, particularly round the Greengate area. Surely houses need to be built where there is employment thus reducing everyone's carbon footprint.
We have recently had a new development at Nethercroft and the builders did not provide the original agreed numbers of affordable houses and we believe this will happen again in view of the price of the land and making the development viable for the builder.
South Levens is not seen as an option because it would be seen from the A590. Yet a large number of recently built houses are already seen from the A590 and the proposed site at East Greengate would also be seen from this road.
We feel, most strongly, that that the preferred option would constitute undesirable over-development of the sites out of keeping with and detrimental to the character and appearance of Levens.