‘Frome deserves better’ Have your say on plans for over 300 new homes in south of Frome

LOCAL campaigners are encouraging residents to have their say on planning applications that could bring up to 319 new houses to Frome.

The campaigners describe the current plans as providing homes that are ‘low-cost’, ‘high-profit’, and ‘environmentally-damaging’. and are not the kind of sustainable housing Frome needs and deserves.

The three housing development sites – which are adjacent to each other – are in the south of Frome, stretch from Little Keyford Lane to either side of the The Mount, and are located near to the proposed Selwood Garden Community, which proposes 1,700 new homes.

Full planning applications have been submitted to Mendip District Council for 118 dwellings on land south of The Mount; and 70 dwellings on land at Little Keyford Lane. And an outline planning application has been submitted for 131 dwellings on land at Little Keyford Lane too The Mount.

The deadline for comments is Thursday 25th February, and Stop SGC – the local group that is campaigning to stop plans for the Selwood Garden Community – says that residents need to make a “positive objection” to the plans.

“In this consultation you can use your voice to influence the plans and encourage the developers to build high-quality, sustainable homes,” said Stop SGC campaigners. “This is an opportunity to be proactive. By explaining to Mendip District Council what homes Frome wants, we can set down a marker for anything else that might be built in our town.”

The campaign highlights that the developers, Barratt, David Wilson and Wainhomes,  should aspire to create a housing development similar to Hanham Hall in Bristol – England’s first large-scale housing scheme that will achieve the 2016 zero-carbon standard – built by Barratt. 

Stop SGC describe the current plans as providing homes that are “low-cost”, “high-profit”, and “environmentally-damaging”. “These plans will not create the kind of sustainable housing Frome needs and deserves. If pushed, these developers can create exemplar homes like the ones Barratt Homes has built in Hanham, Bristol,” said Stop SGC campaigners, “these are the types of homes that Frome deserves.”

The campaign also encourages residents to comment that there is no joined up approach to accessing the three sites; how the plans involve widening the road and the “unnecessary destruction” of hedgerows on Little Keyford Lane; and call for the “cumulative impact” of these three sites to be independently investigated.

To view the plans and comment, visit the Mendip District Council planning website and search using the references – 2019/3076/FUL for the 118 dwellings plan; 2020/0451/FUL for the 70 dwellings plan; and 2020/0341/OTS for the 131 dwellings plan.

www.mendip.gov.uk/planning

For more information about the Stop SGC campaign, visit the website: https://stopsgc196224174.wordpress.com