Weekly Digest: March 17th 2018

Posted on 23/03/2018 by Mark T

As previewed last week, I’d like to spend most of this week updating you on the outputs of the Steering Group workshop held 10 days ago. I spent time this week in the office catching up with the outputs and…. there are a lot. I took a couple of pictures and attached them below so you can get an idea of the work going on and the state of the office! As you can see our work plan dominates the place – but it provides focus for the next 6 months or so. I’ve summarised the main work streams into 2 themes

  1. Neighbourhood Plan. Theme 1: Geographic focus

This theme takes a geographic perspective. We have divided up our Area into 7 blocs split into 2 sections – 4 undeveloped blocs and 3 community areas

  • The undeveloped blocs are:
    • Land west of Toton/Stapleford Lane (between Cleve Ave and A52, down to the Sidings): this is all of the land currently with the Strategic Growth Area
    • Land east of Toton Lane/north of tram terminus (including Bardills and nearby businesses) all the way north to Bramcote and west to Inham Road, Chilwell
    • Land east of Stapleford Lane/south of tram terminus (backing Katherine Drive/Barracks: all the way to Field Lane, Chilwell
    • Land within Chetwynd Barracks.

§  We want to treat these blocs separately as: some have planning permission already (west of Toton Lane); some don’t yet have planning permission, but we know will be developed (Barracks); some are green belt and so may never be developed. We must consider all areas and ensure our views for the long term are included

  • The community areas are:
    • Chilwell West ward
    • Chilwell Meadows
    • Toton

§  We need to consider what, if any, sites there are within these areas (such as the ex-Manor Garage site at the bottom of the High Road) that could be redeveloped and if so how? We also need to assess impacts on these areas arising from development elsewhere, such as the noise mitigation measures needed for the Banks Road area when HS2 comes along.

2. Neighbourhood Plan. Theme 2: Topic focus

This theme is based on the various topics that cover across the area. We’ve identified, in no particular order, the following:

  • Schools (infant, primary, secondary, 6th form)
  • Shops/Community Centre, inc. heritage – a central focus for the Barracks area
  • Community facilities (library, health centre/dentist, allotments, leisure both indoor and outdoor etc.)
  • Housing (design, styles, sustainability, locations)
  • Infrastructure (roads, public transport, cycle ways, footpaths, utilities)
  • Business (existing, new)
  • Environment (green spaces, wildlife corridors, local reserves, flood plains)

§  For each of these topics we need to decide what is needed and where. And provide the backing evidence necessary to justify our proposals

3.   Your chance to get involved!

We have asked you before to let us know if you’d like to help us develop our Plan. And we haven’t followed through when you stuck your hands up. Apologies for that.

Now is the time, however, when we really do need help. Each of the geographic blocs and topics are led by members of the Steering Group. Their first task is to decide what activities are needed and how best to carry them out.

If you are interested in any of these blocs/topics, please get in touch and let us know. We’ll collate the names and pass them on to the relevant leader who will then get back to you to explain how you’ll be able to help and when.  Many thanks

4.      Stakeholder meetings

As mentioned last week that we are arranging a number of meetings with significant landowners in our Area.

On Tuesday we held a very useful meeting with Heart Church, who are based in Talbot Street, Nott’m. The church owns approx. 56 acres of land mostly to the west of Stapleford Lane, backing Cleve Ave. 

The main thing we learned is that the church want to see the land developed as per the current permission for 500 houses. They believe the ideas contained in the East Midlands HS2 Growth Strategy Plan are too speculative and uncertain. Furthermore, they believe that if the Strategy does take off, it will still be a long, long time before it is delivered. They are looking to sell their land in the next couple of years rather than wait perhaps 5-10 years.

We are now arranging meetings with two further stakeholders with interest in land to the west of Stapleford/Toton Lane: UKPP (Toton) and Peveril. I’ll keep you updated on progress

5.      And finally…

Richard and Graham attended the Council’s Jobs and Economy meeting on Thursday. The main item of interest for us was the publication of the latest 2017/2018 SHLAA (Strategic Housing Land Availability Assessment) report. This is a hefty document but is worth a read if you are interested in the Council’s long term thoughts on where houses could be built. It does consider, with caveats, options for the green belt in our Area (see pages 30, 31). Hence the need for us to assess & include all green belt land in our Plan.

The rearranged Toton and Chilwell Meadows CAT meeting will be held on Thursday 22 March at 7.30pm at Toton Methodist Church

 Friends of Toton Fields are holding their annual ‘spring clean’ of Toton Fields on Sunday 25th March between 10.00 and 12.00 noon at Greenwood Centre, Chester Green. If you can spare a couple of hours, please come along and help tidy up the reserve. You can also have a look at the new ponds that have been created as well as the newly constructed / improved paths

And that is more than enough for this week. Another lengthy edition, I’m afraid, but I wanted to keep you informed of our work plan for the next 6 months. Please stick your hand up if you’d like to help us in this task – it will be much appreciated. 

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Weekly Digest: 11th March 2018

Posted on 13/03/2018 by katiecttcnf

Hello,

Happy Mothering Sunday! 

Well, the weather last week was milder, the days are longer, the frogs are frisky (in our community pond at least!) so it’s surely time to shake off winter and look forward to summer.  The Steering Group held a planning workshop on Thursday which resulted in a plethora of activities and actions for the next few months being mapped out on the walls of our office. I only wish I could have been there – unfortunately a throat virus kept me away.  I’m looking forward to catching up with the outputs on Monday & I’ll report back on the main themes next week.  In the meantime…

1.      Ongoing consultation activities

·       I reported last week that we had completed our formal community consultation events, and we were pleased with the input gathered. We have now received the reports from our consultants and we will be working through them over the next few weeks. I’ll summarise the outputs in a future digest

·       However, consultation is an ongoing process and we are now planning the next set of activities; targeting businesses and significant landowners in our Area. We plan to survey each business and ideally meet with the larger ones to gather their thoughts and plans for the future.

·       We also want to meet each significant landowner and, to that end, we have arranged to meet with Heart Church next Tuesday. Heart Church own a significant chunk of land to the west of Stapleford Lane (land bordering Cleve Avenue). We want to introduce ourselves to them but, more importantly, understand their thoughts & plans for their landholding in Toton especially in light of the HS2 Growth Strategy proposals.

2.       Community events – see you there!

·       We are also planning to attend as many community events as possible over the next 6 months. During March you will find us at a number of parent events at local schools……  

o   Fairfield Primary Academy on Weds 14th & Thurs 15th between 3.15-6.00

o   Bispham Drive Junior School on Mon 19th & Weds 21st between 3.30-6.30

o   Eskdale Junior School on Weds 28th between 3.30-7.00

·       Our consultants, RCAN, will also be completing the planned street surveys over the next 2 weeks, so if you are around, please take the time to pop over and have a chat:

o   Toton Lane tram terminus on Weds 14th between 9.30am-12.30pm

o   Sainsbury Local, Blenheim Drive on Tues 20th between 9.30 am – 12.00 noon

o   West Point Retail Park on Tues 20th between 1.00pm – 3.30pm

·       A date further ahead for your diary: we have booked a stall at this year’s Toton fete (organised by Toton Tesco) on Saturday July 21st

·       If you know of other fetes or events taking place this summer, please let me know so we can look to come along. As I may have mentioned before, the more feedback/comments/ideas we get from everyone with an interest in our Area, the stronger our Plan will be. 

3.        University outputs published at last!

·       I promised a while ago to share the outputs the university students produced for us last autumn. We have broken down the reports into manageable chunks to make them easier to access. To quickly explain the format of these reports: 23 students were involved in the project and they arranged themselves into 6 working groups (sections). These groups each worked through 3 phases of the project: analysis; consultation; and proposals. Hence the reports are collated into the 3 phases with 6 sections in each (section 3 merged their analysis and consultation phase into one report)

·       You can access all reports from this link to a page on our website.

·       The page provides individual links to all the reports as follows

o   Analysis – 6 separate reports (Sections 3, 4 and 5 are worth a look)

o   Consultation – 5 separate reports (Sections 1 and 5 are worth a look)

o   Proposals – 6 separate reports (all are worth a look but for me Section 3 is the best)

·       Be warned, some of these reports are huge (Proposals, Section3 for instance) and you may be asked to download some to your PC first rather than view them on-line.

·       Please leave your comments about these reports on our website or via email to me. We very much welcome all thoughts and feedback.

4.     And finally…..a couple of snippets:

·       A couple of us attended Bramcote CAT meeting last Monday to hear the latest news of their Neighbourhood Plan. They have finished drafting their Plan and are almost ready to submit it to the Council for examination. However, they have been advised to wait until the Council’s Local Plan is published (expected in June) to ensure their Plan includes relevant Borough policies

·       Talking about published Neighbourhood Plans; Nuthall Parish Council have submitted their Neighbourhood Plan to the Council to review. So if you are interested is seeing what a completed Plan looks like, here is a link to the relevant page on the Council’s website and here is a link to the actual Plan

·       We’ve been in touch with Ruth Hyde, the Chief Executive of Broxtowe Borough Council, requesting a meeting with her to build on the strong relationship we already have with the Planning team. Ruth welcomes the chance to meet us and so it’s now a question of sorting out a convenient date for us both – more on this in a future edition.

That’s all for now, published a day late this week due to attending a meeting yesterday afternoon completing the handover of responsibilities to our new Treasurer, Denise. More news next week.

Kind regards
Graham

On behalf of the CTTC Forum Steering Group
Website:  www.cttcnf.org.uk    Facebook: use this link and ‘like’ us  to stay in touch

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Weekly Digest: 3rd March 2018

Posted on 04/03/2018 by Mark T

The start of March is normally a time to look forward to Spring and beyond, but the ‘beast from the east’ is making that a little difficult for the moment. Thankfully, as I write, this particular beast looks to be finally on its way out, so I’ll take a little time this week to look forward but not until, on behalf of us all on the Steering Group, I say…

  1. Thank you very much, thank you very, very, very much!
    • To each and every one of you who have taken the time to come along to one of our consultation events: Thanks very much! It was great to see you and hear your views.
    • We held our final event last Monday at the Village and around 40 people came along to have a look, ask us questions and – most importantly – let us know their views and opinions. On top of that over 140 have completed our survey, either at an event or else directly on line.
    • Overall, we are very pleased with the response we have gathered. It has provided a lot of useful information as well as some great suggestions for us to take forward
    • We are keeping the online survey going for a further week so any last-minute contributions (or further thoughts) will be very welcome. Here’s the link.
  2. Barracks Masterplan Produced
    • Peter did bring along his draft master plan for the Barracks and not unexpectedly it generated a lot of interest. Peter took away a lot of useful feedback and will be incorporating those ideas into the next version of the plan.
    • We hope to have a revised version in the next week or so and once we have an electronic version, we’ll add it to our website and post a link to it in a future edition, so you can all have a look.
    • As mentioned last week, the draft will be subject to ongoing refinement, but it is a great start and provides something concrete to look at and build on.
  3. Looking forward: Neighbourhood Plan next steps
    • The Steering Group are meeting next week and the main item on the agenda is to consider the next steps in producing our Plan
    • The community consultation phase was a vital component, but we now need to buckle down and start to develop our vision for the future and identify the main objectives we want to see delivered. After than we need write the policies that will ensure our objectives are met. It is likely this next phase will take us 6 months or so.
    • We will be breaking down this significant task into manageable chunks of work and it is likely we will need help to gather and collate the evidence as well as to draft up our policies
    • I know a lot of you have indicated you are willing to provide some ‘hands on’ support and it will be very welcome. Once the SG have decided on the best way forward, and identified specific pieces of work, I’ll provide more details in a future digest how you can get involved.
  4. And finally.…
    • We are always looking to extend our communications to everyone in our Area whether signed up with us or not. So, we have started to produce articles for the free papers such as Grapevine, Breeze & Toton Connected. If you know of any publication that we could use to publish news about us, please let me know. We want to reach as wide an audience as we can
    • We are also looking to improve the management of this weekly digest. At the moment I look after the mailing lists myself but with over 650 email addresses, we need to be sure we provide a professional service to you. So, we have signed up with MailChimp, which is a commonly used package to manage and distribute e-newsletters. More on this in the next week or so when we finalise the process. Rest assured we will take great care of your personal data and only provide MailChimp with the absolute minimum they need. But if you have concerns about us moving to this service, please let me know    

And that’s all for this week folks – a little shorter than previous weeks’ editions, and all the better for it! Tune in next week for more news and ramblings

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Weekly Digest: 24th February 2018

Posted on 24/02/2018 by Mark T

Hello everyone

There’s a lot to report this week so I’ll skip the normal preamble and get straight to business.

1.      Consultation exercise almost over: a last chance to get involved!

  • We are nearing the end of our consultation exercise. We’ve held 3 events so far (including the AGM ‘launch’ session) with 1 more to go – this Monday 26th at the Village Hotel (1st floor mtg room) between 2.30pm and 7.00pm
  • This series of consultations are designed to gather input to our Neighbourhood Plan. They are centered around you! We need your thoughts and ideas; your concerns and issues; your dreams and aspirations. All comments captured will help shape the policies in our Plan.
  • The 2 events held last week were mixed. We didn’t attract many attendees to the session at Chilwell Community Centre, but the weather on the day was pretty awful so it wasn’t too surprising that people decided to stay warm and dry. On the other hand, the session at Toton saw almost 30 people dropping in at various times to have a chat and give us their views.
  • We’ve also been running an on-line survey and, so far, almost 90 people have taken part. If you haven’t completed your survey yet, please take a few moments to do it over the weekend. The results of these surveys will provide yet more evidence that we’ll use to justify the policies in our Plan. It is vital your views are included. Here’s the link.  Many thanks!
  • Following Monday’s session, we’ll need a couple of weeks to collate and summarise all the input. After that, we will continue to gather further data (demographics, traffic stats etc.) to help strengthen our evidence before we start to draft the Plan.

2.       Drafting a Master Plan for the Barracks

  • If you come along to Monday’s session at the Village you will (hopefully) be able to see a draft of a Master Plan for the Barracks site
  • As reported last week, we continue to work with Peter, a University graduate, who is developing a master plan for us. We’ve provided him with ideas based on the initial feedback and thoughts collated so far & Peter hopes to have a plan ready to view at the Village.
  • Based on your feedback we asked for some key elements to be included:
    1. the heritage elements and major green spaces of the site (mostly the eastern flank) must be protected
    2. position a ‘plaza’ type retail area next to the memorial garden
    3. provide a major north/south road through the site to relieve pressure on Stapleford Lane
  • We met Peter, on Monday, to provide further thoughts and he plans to incorporate them in a finished version. We are looking forward to seeing the result! Of course, whatever is presented can be further refined, but it’s still exciting to see something springing up from our ideas.

3.        Meeting #1: D2N2 (The Local Enterprise Partnership for Notts and Derbys)

  • Richard and Graham had a useful meeting with the Chairman and Chief Executive (interim) on Tuesday. We asked to meet following the disappointing outcome from the latest HS2 Strategy Board and the struggle to form a Delivery Board for East Midlands Hub Station. The Delivery Board is needed to transform the ideas contained in the Strategy into actions
  • We held a wide-ranging discussion that focused on 2 main elements:
    1. our belief that we should all work together to attract a ‘marquee signing’ to the Innovation Village that will encourage other top-notch businesses to the area.  D2N2 endorsed the idea and offered their support
    2. our ambitions to set up our CIC.  We need to access significant funding to avoid the need to continually scratch around for a grant here or a donation there (albeit they are all very welcome). Again, they were very supportive and agreed to provide suggestions of funding streams that would be appropriate for us to access.

4.     Meeting #2: HS2 Ltd

  • Richard, Norman & Graham met with Paul Mullins (HS2 Ltd Stakeholder Mgr) on Friday for a quick catch-up. Again, it was another productive meeting and Paul has kindly agreed to come along to our session at Village on Monday. So, if you have further questions relating to HS2, come along and ask him. Paul aims to be with us late afternoon – after 4.
  • We discussed a broad range of issues with Paul covering matters such as noise mitigation measures, flood plain risks, & power line considerations. These are all big topics, so we agreed to set up a workshop to discuss them in some detail. We will be inviting key stakeholders along to join us including:
    1. the Environment Agency who are responsible for Erewash Valley & associated flood plain,
    2. Western Power who own the substation at the top of Stapleford Lane and all the pylons/power lines down through Toton Fields Nature Reserve & Sidings
  • We still need to finalise the list attendees and agree the process for the workshop, but it was a positive start and reinforces the importance HS2 places on the views of the Forum. We clearly have the ability to influence the design of the site especially since we are talking to HS2, whilst there is still time, before final designs become ‘fixed’.

5.     And finally.…

Our thanks to Cllr Eric Kerry, one of our Area County Councillors, who has kindly donated £250 to the Forum to help us purchase an office printer and associated supplies. It means we no longer need to use commercial printers whenever we need a small number of documents.

Our thanks to Jenny Kirkwood, our RCAN consultant who has been undertaking additional ‘street’ consultations for us. She was at Tesco Toton on Friday and plans to be at Sainsbury’s (Blenheim Drive) and West Point shopping centre next Tuesday. So, if you see her about, please stop and have a chat and complete a survey! Here’s another link to the online version

Our thanks also to John Berry, our Independent Examiner who has completed his review of our accounts for the last year. We’ve been given a clean bill of health and as soon as we have an electronic version, we’ll upload it to the website, so you have access.

Don’t forget the Toton & Chilwell Meadows CAT mtg next Thurs 1st at 7.30 at Toton Methodist Church

 

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Weekly Digest: 17th February 2018

Posted on 19/02/2018 by katiecttcnf

Hi everyone,

 This week’s digest is a little different. As reported last week, the Steering Group planned to hold a special meeting this week to elect the new chair of the Forum. However, prior to the meeting, one of the candidates withdrew his nomination. And after a quick consultation with the other members of the Steering Group, it was unanimously decided to elect the remaining candidate.

So, it gives me great pleasure to announce that Richard Hutchinson will continue to be our Chairman for the next 12 months. Richard has been a strong Chairman over the last year forging important relationships with key stakeholders. I know he will continue to build on these relationships and ensure the Forum’s voice is heard when decisions are taken relating to major developments in our area. Richard has asked for space this week to provide a “chairman’s message”, so without further ado……

1.     Richard writes…..

“I was delighted to be proposed and subsequently elected by your 2018 Steering Group to continue as your Chairman for the next year in the Forum.

The fantastic attendance at the first AGM some 3 weeks ago really was a huge boost to everyone who has dedicated their time to the Forum over the last 12 months and a real indication to stakeholders at the meeting that our community wants to not only see what the future holds but influence and shape it.

The last 12 months have been all about building a foundation for the Forum with us identifying all of the key stakeholders: HS2 Ltd; East Midlands HS2 Strategy Board; and DIO (Defence Infrastructure Organisation) being only 3. These, along with schools and community groups, will enable us to interact and develop plans jointly for the future of the area. 

That leads me to the most important contributors. Us! The community that live and work here. It has been, and continues to be, our priority to inform you at every step what is happening and what we are learning with regards to these and other organisations thoughts and actions. Understanding their proposals enable us, the community, to not only engage and comment on information received but also to input ideas and concerns related to the future look of our community. We have, through the digest, social media channels and community events tried to communicate the best we can with you all and we will continue to do this throughout 2018. We ask you all to contribute as much as you can to enable us to get as much community input as we can into the work that needs to be done.

Moving forward, this year is all about us generating the Neighbourhood Plan and producing a document that states what we, the community, feel should (and shouldn’t) be included in the development of our area in the coming years. This is going to take an incredible amount of time and hard work for everyone involved. I encourage you all to contribute as this is our chance to influence the direction of development in our area over the next 20 years.

In conclusion I want to express my thanks to the Steering Group of 2017 for all the work they have done and to also welcome our new members for 2018. We will be looking for additional people to join us for key sub committees through 2018 so please let us know if you can spare some time to help and I look forward to talking with you all throughout 2018 at a number of events we will be holding.

Remember, this is our time to Shape the Future of our community.

Thanks, 
Richard

2.      Quick clarification from last week.

•        I’ve received a couple of emails querying a statement I made last week relating to the work of the DIO (Defence Infrastructure Organisation). I stated, “They have submitted an application to Broxtowe Borough Council with plans to build a total of 1,500 dwellings on the site (excluding the married quarters housing at the top end).”

·      It was carelessly phrased because the DIO have not submitted any sort of ‘application’ to the Council regarding the number of houses. I didn’t intend to convey the impression that a planning application has been made for the site. That will come much further down the line.

·      At this stage, the DIO “supports the allocation of part of the site, proposed by Broxtowe Borough Council, for 500 houses before 2028 […..] and has identified further capacity for 1,000 houses post 2028…..”

·       So, for the moment, the DIO (as well as us, of course,) are waiting for the completion of the Local Plan process when the housing numbers for the site will be determined.

3.     And finally, a couple of community notices….

·       Friends of Toton Fields: have asked us to let you know that the contractors are back on Toton Fields Nature Reserve finishing off the work started last year. This involves thinning out some more trees in the woodland near to the Greenwood Centre as well as creating a new bridleway through some trees to avoid the need for riders to use the footpath at the bottom of the hill. There will also be improvements to the paths around the Greenwood Centre.

·       Toton and Chilwell Meadows CAT Meeting. Cllr Lee Fletcher has asked us to remind you that a CAT meeting for the ward will be held on: 
Thursday 1 March 2018 at 7.30pm at Toton Methodist Church (Room 1), Stapleford Lane

Tune in next week for a report on a meeting we are having with the Chairman and interim Chief Executive of D2N2 LEP, the Local Enterprise Partnership, a key stakeholder in the development of the HS2 Growth Strategy Area. I’ll also provide an update on the work of the university graduate in developing a high-level masterplan for us as well as providing feedback on our current round of consultation events.

Kind regards
Graham

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Weekly Digest: 10th February 2018

Posted on 10/02/2018 by Mark T

Hello again

This week has been a time to draw a little breath between the hectic planning and promotion of the AGM and the next series of consultations taking place – starting next week!

The Steering Group held its first meeting last Thursday – a ‘get to know you’ session to welcome old and new members. The meeting was a positive and it quickly became clear we are now a stronger team and will benefit from the knowledge and wide experience of the new members. Elections were held for the main officer posts and I’m pleased to let you know that we have a new Secretary (me!); a new Treasurer (Denise Lewis); with Nicola Lamplough being re-elected as Vice-Chair. As for the Chair, we received 2 nominations for the position so, to give each candidate a chance to make a formal pitch for the role, we agreed to meet again next week to make the decision. More on this next week.

In last week’s digest, I promised more information from a couple of meetings we’ve attended over the last 2 or 3 weeks:

  1. Defence Infrastructure Organisation (DIO) meeting: Jan 25th
  • The DIO is the organisation charged by the Ministry of Defence to sell Chetwynd Barracks.  They have submitted an application to Broxtowe Borough Council with plans to build a total of 1,500 dwellings on the site (excluding the married quarters housing at the top end).
  • As mentioned last week, they are now waiting for the Council to provide an official site allocation number.  Once they know the number, the DIO will then be able to assess the value of the land and proceed to sell the site.
  • The DIO agreed to provide us with all the analysis/assessments they undertook to arrive at their proposal. It will be good to see the rationale underpinning the 1,500 number as it will give us a chance to question/counter some of the inevitable assumptions they will have made on – for instance – projected traffic volumes.
  • We also informed the DIO that we intend to undertake our own Heritage Character assessment for the Barracks as we believe their report provided an incomplete picture. We are now in the process of engaging our own consultant to undertake this work.
  1. HS2 Strategy Board meeting: Jan 30th
  • A couple of further observations from this meeting
  • HS2 Ltd provide regular updates to the Board and this time they presented their latest thinking on the design of the station which included:
    •  The station – both HS2 and classic services – will now be set above ground level. Previously the classic lines were located at ground level.
    • Parking capacity at the station is being reviewed. Currently 1,700 has been allocated but concern was expressed this may not be enough.
  • The councillors representing Erewash Borough Council on the Board remain opposed to HS2 and the station. Of course, this is understandable given the huge disruption the construction of the line & viaduct will bring to Long Eaton
  • Nevertheless, we would like to engage (even collaborate) with Erewash councillors where we have mutual interest, such as ensuring a new road into the station is created near to Asda. [At the moment, HS2 are only planning pedestrian/bus access to the station from Long Eaton.] But, for the moment, engagement with Erewash councillors is proving to be hard work.
  1. Meeting with Broxtowe Borough Council, Planning Dept.: Feb 2nd
  • We held a useful meeting with Steffan Saunders, Head of Planning, at the Council. As reported last week, he provided an update on the latest Peveril application. Last week, I mentioned the Planning meeting was due to be held last week. In fact, it will take place this coming week on Weds 14th. Apologies for any confusion caused.
  • Steffan went on to provide a generic update on progress with Local Plan part 2. It is inevitably taking time for the Planning team to wade through the vast amount of input they received from last autumn’s consultation.  However, regarding our Area, Steffan was able to say:
    • They are exploring an option to join together the policies relating to Toton Lane and Chetwynd Barracks and treat both areas as one coherent development. If so, this will be good for the Forum as we have long argued the need to treat development of both sites holistically, so we don’t replicate development in both areas. For instance, original thoughts for the Barracks included reserving some space to build commercial properties. But given the proposed scale of the ‘Innovation Village’ at Toton Lane, do we really need further commercial development on the Barracks?
    • Assessments will shortly start on the impacts to the infrastructure (roads, utility services etc.) resulting from proposals within the Local Plan. So, expect to see more hi-viz jacketed people with poles and measuring devices looking busy around our Area.
    • Finally, he told us he thought the Forum’s response to the consultation was measured and strong. Whilst he couldn’t give firm commitments at this time, he indicated we could expect to see a number of our proposals included in the next version of the Plan. This demonstrates, to me, the growing stature of the Forum and the influence we can exert with local decision makers.
  1.     But finally……. don’t forget the….
  • …. Community consultation roadshow coming to a place near you NEXT WEEK! We are at:
    • Chilwell Community Centre (next to the Library) next Tuesday 13th between 2.30pm and 7pm. I know it’s pancake day, but it will still be good to see you there and gather your thoughts and opinions for the future of both Chilwell and Toton!
    •  Toton Methodist Church, Stapleford Lane next Thursday 15th between 2.30pm and 7pm
  • Also, don’t forget our online survey. Over 50 have responded so far, which is good; but we need a whole lot more. So, if you haven’t done so yet, please take a couple of minutesto answer 4 or 5 short questions:  CTTC Forum Online Survey

Okay, this has been another long’ish report. I try to keep them reasonably short but sometimes there is so much to tell. Anyway, more next week, including a report on further work being undertaken for us by a University graduate student. Bet you can’t wait!

Kind regards
Graham

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Weekly Digest 20th January 2018

Posted on 21/01/2018 by Mark T

Another short’ish report this week as the Steering Group are focused exclusively on our AGM – next Sunday 28th at 3pm at The Village – in case you’ve forgotten! 

I don’t apologise for the reminder: it is crucial that you, our members, as well as residents of our Area, have the chance to review our work – indeed, our performance – over the past year. 

Equally important is the appointment of  a new Steering Group to take the work forward over the next 12 months. And let me make a plea: we are looking for people to join the Steering Group. Next year will be critical; we’re aiming to produce our Neighbourhood Plan and submit it to the Council for consultation & examination by the end of the Autumn. We need people willing to provide a little time to help gather information and help produce the policies and draft the Plan.  If you are interested in helping us, please come along and let us know.

But next Sunday is much more than just an annual review.

  1. We are kicking off our consultation exercise by showcasing the best of the university work and hope you will use it to stimulate your ideas for the future of our Area.  There are approx 20 posters  illustrating our past, present along with a lot of ideas about the future.  Take time to have a look at them and let us know your thoughts. Help to shape the future.
  2. Our engagement consultant will also be on hand. She will be asking you to complete a short questionnaire to tell us what concerns you most about living in Toton and Chilwell. There is also a section for you to tell us what is needed to improve our area.
  3. If that wasn’t enough we can now confirm that HS2 Ltd will be at the meeting. It’s true we have no direct control over the station and how it is built, nevertheless we are developing a good relationship with HS2 and we know they want to hear our views.  
    • For instance, the location of the platforms are pretty well settled: the southern end will be opposite (roughly) Neighwood Close; whilst the northern end is in line (roughly) with the top of the hill at Banks Road.  
    • However, the location of the main station buildings / concourse is perhaps up for debate. Latest thinking from HS2 locates the station entrance near to the southern end of the platform ‘footprint’. 
    • But, given the development at Toton Lane, doesn’t it make more sense for the main entrance/concourse to be nearer the northern end? So it is closer to the proposed Innovation Village? Your thoughts?
    • Sunday gives you the chance to speak to HS2 directly. So you can also ask them about the recently announced plan to build & open the station and access infrastructure in the mid-2020’s to run ‘classic’ services in advance of HS2 itself.
  1. We are also pleased to confirm that senior figures within D2N2 (the Chair and/or CEO) will be attending. The organisation is coordinating the strategic ideas / plans for the development of the Toton Lane site. So you can ask them about current ideas for the Innovation Village. 
  2. Finally,  we’ve invited the DIO (Defence Infrastructure Organisation – part of the MoD) to come along to answer queries about the sale/initial development of the Barracks. They said they would get back to us by today to confirm attendance however I’ve not heard anything yet, which is a tad disappointing. When they let me know,  I’ll let you know.

Okay, I’ve rambled on more than intended (not unusual, I know!), so I’ll stop now. 

Please do all you can to attend the meeting and consultation event – you won’t regret it. 

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Annual General Meeting Sun Jan 28th 3pm at The Village

Posted on 06/01/2018 by CTTC Forum
  • We’re continuing to sift through the visions and ideas provided by the university students.
  • It will be difficult to choose the best of them to showcase at the AGM. We have ordered some display screens & we’ll aim to show 20 or so of the best
  • To whet you appetite I’ve added a couple to our website and you can link to them here:
    • These are high level maps illustrating the ‘connectivity’ of the two main areas Chetwynd Barracks and Toton Lane. It reflects the view that there needs to be joined-up development across our area.
    • We know there will be a lot of houses built at both Toton Lane and the Barracks, but lets make sure they complement each other and avoid duplication.
    • First slide illustrates the connection between the station, Toton Lane and the Barracks
    • These two slides illustrate the green corridors we expect to see linking Toton Fields with Hobgoblin Wood: this one is map-based; this one is more abstract.Come along to the AGM

      to see more like this – as well as more detailed ideas for the specific areas.

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Looking forward to 2018 & beyond

Posted on 30/12/2017 by CTTC Forum
  • Looking back, we have had a very busy year (and a bit) and we are now firmly established as a Neighbourhood Forum. But no more on that here – I’ll leave the details to the Annual Report
  • However I thought you might be interested to know the shape of the next 12 months or so. We have produced a project plan which, as you might expect, is almost continuously being reviewed and refined.
  • The end result, of course, is the production of our Neighbourhood Plan. And you may be wondering when you can expect to see it completed.
  • Given the scope of our Area contains both the HS2 Growth area and the Barracks, you can appreciate this will take time. [On average, Neighbourhood Plans take circa 2 years before they are ‘made’ i.e. adopted by the council]
  • Rough timetable from our current project plan is as follows:
    • Spring 2018:
      • Community engagement: finish gathering ideas/input
      • Complete evidence gathering e.g. traffic analysis etc
    • Summer 2018:
      • Draft policies and plan produced
    • Autumn 2018:
      • Forum consults on draft Plan: obtains feedback and refines
      • Plan submitted to Broxtowe Council
      • Independent Examiner appointed
    • Spring 2019:
      • Council’s consultation of Plan (circa 8 weeks), followed by…
      • Independent examination (circa 6 weeks)
      • Plan modified if necessary
    • Summer 2019:
      • Referendum: all residents in the Area will have a vote
      • If approved – Plan is then ‘made’.
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Follow-up Notices

Posted on 16/12/2017 by CTTC Forum
  • Toton & Chilwell Meadows CAT meeting output. 
    One of the outputs from the meeting was that Cllr Fletcher kindly provided a link an online crime database at    : http://www.ukcrimestats.com/
    I’ve had a quick delve into this site and it makes interesting reading. It is pretty easy/intuitive to follow, you just need to enter your postcode.

  • Improvements to Toton Fields Reserve paths and woodlands are continuing. It now looks as though it will run into the new year. The Friends continue to keep an eye on things and liaise with the contractors/council. Let us know if you have any concerns/issues about these improvements.

  • I promised a flavour of the students work.  Here are links from our website:
    • This one captures images from 100 years ago during WW1
    • Another one from the past, portraying a timeline of Toton Sidings
    • An interesting but unusual view of our Area – tube-style map. [No, there are no plans to build an underground network in Toton and Chilwell!]
    • Some ‘walkability’ diagrams. These show how easy it is to get around our area; i.e. how far we can walk within 5 mins (purple circle) or 10 mins (orange circle)
    • Finally, we know traffic to/from HS2 will create problems.
      Here’s a possible solution – original taken from HS2 Growth Strategy
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