The next Forum AGM will be held in January with a provisional date of Wednesday 11th January at 7pm. Please can all members & friends make a note of this date in your diaries & calendars.
It will be held via Zoom and follow a similar pattern to last year’s meeting. Confirmation of the date and time will follow in December, along with registration, voting and nomination details as per last time.
It is an important part of the Forum calendar to review the past year (well in fact 2021 & 2022 this time), and have the annual reports & accounts, steering group members etc. ratified and approved formally by the wider Forum membership. It is also an opportunity for you to ask any questions you may have.
As always please do feel free to ask any questions you may have on this or anything else via the Contact Us page, and we’ll do our best to answer them via the Questions and Answers page.
This is just a quick update following on from the Newsflash published earlier this week – see here
The Forum Steering Group lobbied our local councillors (and hopefully some of you did too), and we are pleased to report that the motion (from the Leader of the Council) to withdraw the SM-SPD from the Full Council meeting agenda on Wednesday evening, pending further review, had unanimous support from within the Chamber.
We have subsequently written to Councillor Radulovic to accept his offer, made on Wednesday evening, to meet with the Forum with regard to the SM-SPD. We will keep you informed once we have had that meeting, and have any more information about the further planned review of the SM-SPD by the Council.
It just goes to show how effective the Community & Forum can be when it bares its teeth! The key to success is continued engagement with not just all of you and the wider community, but also the Council and other key stakeholders.
As always please do feel free to ask any questions you may have on this or anything else via the Contact Us page, and we’ll do our best to answer them via the Questions and Answers page.
The Council Meeting of the 12th October includes (at item 8 on the agenda) a request to adopt the updated Strategic Masterplan for Toton and Chetwynd Barracks. The first indication of this activity was an informal notification received by the Forum on Friday evening 7th October.
The Masterplan is a significant part of the planning process for changes to be made in our Area and we feel that such short notice is effectively “pushing it through” Council without the opportunity for the Community, and other respondents to the consultation, to read and understand the updated Masterplan, particularly in the light of the Government’s Integrated Rail Plan. The 95 page Masterplan does not show what changes have been made to the original consultation draft version.
The Neighbourhood Forum are writing to the Council asking that this item be delayed until the subsequent Council Meeting to allow adequate time for review and would ask you to do the same by emailing your councillor.
Apologies as it appears that our automated mailer removed the YouTube link to the History Chap video in the Latest News edition that went out over the weekend. However it can be viewed via our website here.
N.B. All previous posts can be viewed on the Our Posts page on the website.
Following on from last week’s post, Broxtowe have responded to the Independent Examiner’s initial questions contained in her Independent Examiner’s Procedural letter. This response document is available on Broxtowe’s website which is linked from our Plan page.
Further details of the examination process and timetable will follow in due course, and we will keep you updated once we know more on this.
Many (most) of you will be aware of the National Shell Filling Factory explosion which occurred on 1st July 1918 on the site of the now Chetwynd Barracks. 134 people died (including some of the Canary Girls) and many more were injured on that fateful day.
Steve, our Community Development Focus Group Lead, has come across this description of the day in question presented by the History Chap:-
A word of warning, some of the description of the aftermath is quite graphic, so those of you of a nervous disposition beware!
As always please do feel free to ask any questions you may have on this or anything else via the Contact Us page, and we’ll do our best to answer them via the Questions and Answers page.
Jill Kingaby BSc (Econ) MSc MRTPI has been appointed to undertake the Independent Examination of the Neighbourhood Plan. This week we received the Independent Examiner’s Procedural letter setting out some initial requests for information. Most of the requests in the short term require Broxtowe to respond. However, one for us was for her letter to be added to our website, which we have done – see the updated Neighbourhood Plan page. We await further details of the examination process and timetable to be followed in due course.
In the meantime, the Steering Group are reviewing the Regulation 16 Consultation responses received by Broxtowe. If you are interested in taking a look they are available (with personal details redacted) on this page & scroll down to responses.
Beeston and District Civic Society are hosting some Heritage Open Days see here for further details. At the event next Wednesday 14th September the Forum will have a stand detailing the heritage assets on Chetwynd Barracks, including some of our ideas for re-purposing them once the MoD have vacated the site (currently scheduled for 2026) and its subsequent redevelopment. As you know we are keen to retain and re-use as many of these historical buildings as is feasible within our Neighbourhood Plan for the community to enjoy, and form a heritage trail within the site to keep the history alive!
So please do come along to the event at 6pm next Wednesday at the Royal British Legion, Hall Croft, Beeston (details via the link above) and come and say hello. There is also a talk during the evening about Boots from Local to Global, which I am sure will be of interest to many of you as a large local employer.
As always please do feel free to ask any questions you may have on this or anything else via the Contact Us page, and we’ll do our best to answer them via the Questions and Answers page.
Update: This Bid Failed.See This link for more information. (Note the information in the article is not completely accurate, the 4,500 homes figure is the capacity of Chetwynd Barracks + The Strategic Land for Growth. Chetwynd Barracks has a capacity of 1,500).
Across all forms of media from the BBC, Nottingham Post, Notts TV, NG9 News and more Toton has been in the spotlight following the new £40m bid from Nottinghamshire County Council for a share of the government’s “Levelling Up Fund”.
This is to help deliver the much needed housing and employment in our area. The housing allocation was originally set by central government and then passed to the local planning authority, in our case Broxtowe Borough Council, to provide the necessary land for development. Additionally, Chetwynd Barracks was deemed to be surplus to future requirements by the Ministry of Defence and included in the overall figures. Combined this makes our area highly important within the context of the larger strategic growth area being worked up by the East Midlands Development Company (EMDevCo).
The link road shown in the map below (Nottinghamshire County Council’s Draft Proposal) would provide access to the 1,500 proposed dwellings on the Chetwynd Barracks site, and the 2,000 to 3,000 proposed dwellings to the north of Toton both east and west of Stapleford Lane. This would also add the opportunity for new public transport provision, access to the proposed new Network Rail Toton Station and include walking and cycling facilities.
The provision of a new access road usually precedes a large-scale development as it makes it a more attractive proposition for developers, being both easier to sell or let the proposed dwellings, and giving more efficient access to the building site.
From a Neighbourhood Forum perspective we are broadly in favour of the scheme (as it aligns well with our aspirations & policies in our own Plan) and have written to Nottinghamshire County Council to this effect having also supported this approach in past meetings with them. The diagram above is indicative with further detail to follow as the planning process proceeds. In particular, the junction layout where the link road meets the A52, will need careful consideration/consultation.
Our key objectives for the area remain the same in creating a quality environment for new and future residents as demonstrated in the Neighbourhood Plan i.e.the delivery of high quality, energy efficient homes with accessible green spaces. A priority following local consultation was to ensure good access which did not create damaging levels of congestion on Stapleford Lane and Swiney Way. Everyone can remember the disruption that came with the delivery of NET! The proposed road will help divert both construction traffic and future residential traffic movement from Stapleford Lane and Swiney Way whilst also helping speed up the construction phase.
Ian C, Infrastructure Focus Group Lead
As always please do feel free to ask any questions you may have on this or anything else via the Contact Us page, and we’ll do our best to answer them via the Questions and Answers page.
The consultation on your Neighbourhood Plan closes this coming Friday 5th August. If you haven’t already done so, please respond in support of it. It has taken six long years and a lot of hard work by everyone, especially the Forum Steering Group (past & present), to get the Plan to this final consultation stage. It will then go before an Independent Examiner who will review all the documents and consultation responses before making their recommendation and before it can be put to all residents within the Forum Area (the two borough wards of Chilwell West and Toton & Chilwell Meadows) at a local referendum. Assuming it passes both these stages succesfully, the Neighbourhood Plan will be adopted by Broxtowe Borough Council, and then carry as much weight as the Local Plan for planning decions within our Area.
This consultation is your opportunity to show your support for the Plan. Submissions can be made online or via downloadable forms. We encourage as many of our members and friends as possible to respond in support of the Neighbourhood Plan, as it provides the framework, policies, aspirations and guidelines that will shape the future of Toton and Chilwell for years to come (up to 2040!).
Further details and how to respond can be found on our Plan Page and via the Broxtowe website. Thank you in anticipation of a good response.
