Comment

Representation ID: 5558

Received: 20/02/2015

Respondent: Essex County Council

The emerging Brentwood Surface Water Management Plan does not appear to be referenced in the Local Plan (other than forthcoming evidence) as being considered in the determination of any spatial strategy. The emerging draft, highlights a number of areas to be at a higher risk than others to surface water flooding, namely West Horndon, Ingatestone and Brentwood Town Centre. Such areas should not be precluded from development but will lead to additional work to identify appropriate mitigation and amelioration work.

ECC welcome the opportunity to provide advice should any sites in the borough come forward where there may be opportunities to alleviate existing flooding.

Comment

Representation ID: 5559

Received: 20/02/2015

Respondent: Essex County Council

It is unfortunate that Question 11 does not seek views on the historic environment of the Borough

Comment

Representation ID: 5565

Received: 20/02/2015

Respondent: Essex County Council

The consultation refers to the Essex Historic Environment Record, which includes details of all listed buildings, scheduled monuments, designated and other non-designated heritage assets it does not provide an assessment of the significance of those heritage assets, in the form of a Historic Environment Characterisation, it only refers to designated assets. ECC recommend that further consideration and evidence should be given to all the historic assets across the borough as recorded in the Essex Historic Environment Records.

Comment

Representation ID: 5566

Received: 20/02/2015

Respondent: Essex County Council

ECC as Minerals Planning Authority will continue to work with Brentwood BC to address the requirements of defined Mineral Safeguarding Areas (MSAs) and Mineral Consultation Areas (MCA's) within the Local Plan in accordance with policy S8 of the Adopted Essex Replacement Minerals Local Plan. The aim is to ensure that known locations of specific minerals are not needlessly sterilised by other forms of development, whilst not creating a presumption that the defined resources will ever be worked.

Comment

Representation ID: 5567

Received: 20/02/2015

Respondent: Essex County Council

ECC as Waste Planning Authority will continue to work with Brentwood BC to ensure closer working between local planning authorities to integrate the need for waste management with other spatial concerns in the preparation of Local Plans, in accordance with the National Planning Policy for Waste (October 2014). The aim is to ensure that there are sufficient opportunities to meet the identified needs of an area for the management of waste and to apply and promote the waste management hierarchy within sustainable development.

Comment

Representation ID: 5568

Received: 20/02/2015

Respondent: Essex County Council

ECC support the Interim SA report as a useful document and approach to appraise the various options / alternatives. There are specific concerns regarding "Reasonable Alternatives and Historic Environment as follows:
* the status of the evidence base available and whether sufficient evidence exists to suggest that the sites explored at this stage represents all the "reasonable" alternatives for strategic growth; and
* The Sustainability Appraisal fails to assess the Historic Environment to an appropriate level.

Object

Representation ID: 5569

Received: 20/02/2015

Respondent: Essex County Council

ECC consider this consultation to be a starting point and that the evidence still to be undertaken and published is required to enable full consideration of all reasonable alternative growth options to take place and to inform a preferred spatial strategy. ECC is concerned that the Strategic Growth Options have been prepared in advance of this evidence base and until the evidence is in place and publicly available, it is not possible for ECC to support any of the Strategic Growth Options.

Comment

Representation ID: 5570

Received: 20/02/2015

Respondent: Essex County Council

Despite recent improvements there are still a number of locations on the local strategic road network where journeys are unreliable or improvements will be required to support significant numbers of new homes. ECC will continue to identify measures to tackle the causes of unreliable journeys and work with local planning authorities to identify investment needs to support growth.

Comment

Representation ID: 5571

Received: 20/02/2015

Respondent: Essex County Council

ECC, as highway authority, will need to be satisfied with the approach to highway modelling and the necessary mitigation required on the overall network and key junctions before support can be given to any future strategy and strategic development sites. Any modelling work should assist in identifying particular areas within Brentwood urban area which experience unacceptable periods of congestion and key pinch points (eg Wilsons Corner, Brentwood). It is noted that some 2500 dwellings are likely to be provided in urban areas and it will be necessary to ascertain the potential cumulative impact of these sites on the network.

The highways modelling should also have regard to a number of other national, sub—regional and local highway infrastructure projects and investment commitments within and surrounding the borough including:

* A12 M25 to Chelmsford (D17) - raising section from M25 to Chelmsford to 3 lanes to help address congestion problems and inconsistent standards in the next road period (next 5 years)
* M25 Junction 28 improvement (E12) - upgrading the interchange with the A12 to provide dedicated left turn slip lanes and improvement of gyratory system - Late Road Period (2021).
* Lower Thames Crossing
* A127 Corridor for Growth as outlined in the "A127 corridor for Growth - an Economic Plan "local roads" such as the A128.

As part of any highway modelling it will be necessary to involve the Highways Agency given the proximity to the A12 and M25, and to ensure their support for any underlying parameters to modelling, and their views of the impact of strategic sites on their network.