Garendon Park and the adjoing estate have a history of bids from various builders to develop the land for new housing. Each one has met with opposition from residents but I believe we need to win the war not endless fight battles against successive plans.
The latest, most recent development consortium is led by Wm Davis Ltd and Perimmon Homes. You may also know that the option to use the Estate for building was effectively rejected in September 2006 when the Labour-led Cabinet asked planners 'to look for alternatives'. The search for alternatives turned attention to the eastern side of the town. At the same time, in December 2006 the County Council recruited consultants to look at transport plans which would be needed for any further development of Loughborough. They found, as we suspected that there was no affordable road solution for developments in the west of Loughborough, although I believe they would have favoured a western ring road intersecting with J23. An eastern development (Loughborough/Cotes or Wymeswold Airfield) would, however, have been achievable in highways terms.
This work then went before the Public Examination of the East Midlands Regional Plan in summer 2007 which I attended. The Inspectors were not impressed with the fact that, as` they saw it, a pre-existing need for more roads seemed to be leading the planners' choice of location.
The situation rested with the Conservatives who run Charnwood Borough Council. So it was that on 25th September 2008 they proposed the Garendon Estate as preferred option for 3,500 dwellings and 20 hectares of employment land, as well as a major site near Thurmaston.
It felt as if we are being told we gave the wrong answer in the consultation two years earlier and we were being asked to go back and think again.... until we give the answer they wanted. Their consultation lasted from 24th October 2008 for six weeks. About 90% of the responses from the north of the Borough were opposed to Garendon. Many suggested Cotes or Wymeswold as an alternative.
On 14th November 2008 the Leics County Council gave its response to the Garendon option proposed by the Charnwood Conservatives. It was not supportive of the Borough's position. Their preference at that time was for a site at Cotes promoted by Davidsons.
The decision was due to be made by the Borough Council in October or November 2009. However, fearful of a reaction before the elections, they failed to make a decision. It soon became clear that, despite promises, the new Tory/LDem Government was not going to give local residents any real power over the scale of housebuilding. When the Government began to penaise Councils for not building and give developers preferential treatment where no Local Plan existed, the new Conservative administration at Charnwood set some new and ambtious dates to complete the Local Plan.
Meanwhile because of their delay, the period of the new Plan took on extra years to 2026 and with it a requirement to build more houses, sometimes called the supplementary or residual requirement. In doing so they seemed to regard their 2008 consultation on a Preferred Option of Garendon effectively 'banked', despite ever reconciling the public objections. A brief Consultation on the Supplementary Requirement took place in June 2012. The Local Plan Charnwood Local Plan 2011 to 2028 Core Strategy was finally approved in 2015. Charnwood are currently working on a new Local Plan to 2036.