The Inspectors report into the Cherwell Local plan has recently been published. You may recall that there was a consultation on the report that culminated in an Inspectors Review last year, the findings of this review have now been published.
On the whole the report has supported the councils plans to increase the housing numbers on Heyford Park from the original number by a further 1600 or so houses potentially, making the total tally up to approximately 2,700 by the year 2031.
These housing numbers were expected, however both the Village Group and Parish Council made representations at the hearings to argue the case for minimising the impact on the Upper Heyford Village itself and to maintain the Heritage status of the airbase throughout the development. According to the Inspectors report it appears that these representations did not fall on deaf ears and these important points have been documented in the report specifically.
For those of you who want to read the report you can download the PDF document from the link below.
Being 188 pages long, for those of you interested to read the sections relevant to the parish itself the most pertinent pages are 45-47, Section 221 onwards. This is where the inspector notes the importance of the Heritage aspects of the base and maintaining the identity of the village.