FROME Town Council is demanding that all developers “up their game” and improve their building standards to ensure all developments are environmentally sustainable.
The council has created new guidance for its planning committee that will help them say ‘no’ to any developments that do not meet its sustainable building standards.
And the council is hopeful that its new ‘Frome Town Council Climate Emergency Planning Guide’ – which sets out why building standards must improve, and the measures that need to be taken – could help send pressure upwards to Mendip District Council, encouraging them to bring forward their own ‘climate emergency supplementary planning guide’.
“This will then become policy, and Mendip’s planners will have grounds to refuse applications if they do not meet the criteria,” said the town council’s planning and development manager, Jane Llewellyn, at a meeting last week, who stressed that sustainable building standards are needed “sooner rather than later”.
The town council’s guidance asks developers to help achieve Frome’s goal of carbon neutrality by ensuring that all new buildings are net-zero compliant from day one. Recommendations in the town council’s guidance includes using low carbon building materials and resources; allocating space in developments for communal food growing; to include low carbon heating and renewable electricity generation as standard in all new non-residential developments; and to use either a low carbon heat network or individual heat pumps as standard in new homes, instead of connecting them to the gas grid.
“It sends a clear message about the types of developments we want in Frome,” said cllr Lizzie Boyle.
“For too long, developers have done the absolute bare minimum in terms of joining the climate emergency with planning,” added cllr Steve Tanner, who said the guidance will make it clear to developers that the council will say ‘no’. “This will make decision-making much more easier,” said cllr Richard Ackroyd.
The guidance will ‘bridge the gap’ whilst the Mendip Local Plan is updated and clarity is sought about updating the Frome Neighbourhood Plan.
“The planning committee more often than not are very disappointed with the proposed building standards – particularly on the bigger housing developments that we see,” said the town council’s planning and development manager.
“Although we object to these applications – there really isn’t sufficient policy or guidance in place to make developers raise their standards – either in the Mendip’s Local Plan or our Frome Neighbourhood Plan, both of which were prepared in advance of the climate emergency declaration.”
