Swaffham Bulbeck Community Land Trust – Community Engagement
In partnership with local developers Laragh Homes, Swaffham Bulbeck Community Land Trust is drawing up proposals for 45 new homes on the Cemetery/Pony Field site off Heath Road and Quarry Lane in Swaffham Bulbeck.
18 of the homes will be genuinely affordable homes for people living and/or working in Swaffham Bulbeck, or who have family connections to the village. The homes will be available to buy or rent at a mix of tenures, and will be owned by the CLT in perpetuity. The 23 market homes will be sold to fund the building of the community-owned affordable homes. There will also be four self-build plots.
The CLT held a community consultation drop-in event on Monday 14th November – thank you to everyone who came along.
The information that was on display at the event can be seen here:
Community Land Trust Engagement Slides
You can still send the CLT your feedback – by emailing jess@engagementmatters.co.uk (who is facilitating the consultation for the CLT). Please send in your feedback by 2nd December 2022.
Why here?
The proposal offers an opportunity to provide affordable homes for people living locally, helping to address housing supply and affordability issues in the parish, enabling local people to put down roots. As of February 2022, 23 local families had registered with the CLT as needing affordable housing. The site was generously put forward by the landowners in 2017 – its ideal position within the context of the village has identified it for development in the Neighbourhood Plan.
Background
An outline planning application was submitted by the landowners to East Cambridgeshire District Council in 2019 for up to 45 new homes, open space, landscaping and associated infrastructure. This application has not yet been determined and the CLT and Laragh Homes are now on board to move the development forward as a community-led project. The CLT is inviting your input to help shape the proposals, to make sure it is a truly community-led development.
The CLT has been awarded a grant from the Community Housing Fund, provided by Community Led Housing, to support this work. The Community Housing Fund Revenue Programme 2021/22 is funded by the Department for Levelling Up, Housing and Communities (DLUHC).
The project team
The plans are being drawn up by the CLT, with support from local developer, Laragh Homes. The CLT is also working with Engagement Matters, a company that specialises in community
engagement. They will help to plan and manage the consultation process to make sure it is genuine and meaningful, and that everyone can get involved. PiP Architects will be designing the new homes and would like to hear your ideas, such as the types of materials and the style of homes you think would work best on the site, to help inform the design development at the next stage.
Timeline
- Now – community engagement on the community-led outline planning application
- End 2022 – submit updated outline planning application documents to ECDC
- Mid 2023 – draw up detailed designs for the site and the homes, more community engagement
- End 2023/early 2024 – submit a detailed ‘reserved matters’ planning application to ECDC
- 2024 – development could start, subject to the planning process
For more information visit the CLT website: www.swaffhambulbeckclt.org.uk
