Residents fear villages will merge under plans

Residents say they fear their villages could merge if house building is allowed on green spaces.

Plans have been lodged for 150 homes in Waltham, near Grimsby, while an appeal is under way after 300 homes were rejected in nearby Scartho.

Dieter Nelson, the agent for the Waltham development, said it would assist with the under-delivery of housing across North East Lincolnshire and support and sustain village services.

But Councillor Philip Jackson, who is opposing the plans, said local building targets were "undeliverable", while Fiona Chapman, who lives near Waltham, said it would no longer be rural Lincolnshire, but "one town".

Chapman added: "It is a huge concern. Reducing green space impacts health and wellbeing and there are three local villages that are being merged together."

She also said more development could make traffic issues worse.

"In terms of getting from one village to another, it makes no sense and there are certain times of the day when it's gridlocked," she said.

Two years ago, the government set out a target to build one-and-a-half million new homes in England by 2029.

The Waltham proposal, for 15 acres of agricultural land off Bradley Road, is outside the village's development boundary, according to the Local Democracy Reporting Service (LDRS).

However, the council cannot at present demonstrate a five-year supply of expected new housing, and LDRS said this meant planning policy required a presumption in favour of sustainable developments outside the boundaries.

Jackson said the target was "opening the floodgates for developers to put in these speculative applications on greenfield sites".

"It's happening in nearby New Waltham and Scartho as well," he said.

"The reason we're getting them is that we have a government-imposed target of 622 new homes per year which, in my view, is undeliverable in North East Lincolnshire.

"We've had a lot of housing in Waltham over the last 10 years and it's a concern for a lot of local residents.

"We need to try and retain the identity of these villages and there's a real danger Scartho, Waltham and New Waltham will become a large conurbation."

According to LDRS, the council rejected Cyden Homes' plans for 300 homes in Scartho partly because it would intrude into the green corridor between the village and New Waltham.

One Waltham resident told BBC Radio Humberside: "It's ridiculous. We just don't have the infrastructure. It's building up bad feeling for people here."

In a statement, Dieter Nelson said the Waltham development would provide "a well-balanced and designed scheme" with "much-needed" affordable housing, which would make up 20% of homes.

The development would include "significant open space areas to assimilate the development into the site and wider surroundings".

There would be a footpath to the village, which would "reduce the reliance" on cars, while "a significant proportion of vehicular movements" would be away from the village centre.

North East Lincolnshire Council said it had a statutory duty to determine planning applications whether or not they were included in the Local Plan, which guides where houses should be built.

A spokesperson said a development would not be automatically refused if outside areas earmarked in the Local Plan, but the sustainability of the development would be a key consideration.

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